County Looks At Road Work Priorities

Stephens County is preparing for another road paving season.

On Tuesday, the Stephens County Commission unanimously approved a road proposal alternative for 2016.

The commission was presented with a number of choices that were put together by staff and the county’s Roads and Bridges committee.

Stephens County Administrator Phyllis Ayers said that what commissioners approved on Tuesday will be the roads where a large part of the work will have to be out-sourced and bid out to outside crews.

“That is Riverdale Road, Rock Creek Road, Wolf Pit Road, Freedom Drive, Wards Creek Road, and Swilling Road,” said Ayers. “Part of Freedom Drive would be Freedom Court also. That is roughly close to a million dollars. We would spend $334,000 of LMIG funds on Riverdale Road.”

LMIG funds are road monies provided to the county by the state of Georgia.

The rest of the funding would come from bonds taken out by Stephens County last year to forward-fund road work.

SPLOST VI revenues are paying back the bonds.

Ayers said that three of the roads on the list approved by commissioners, Freedom Drive, Wards Creek Road, and Swilling Road, are gravel roads that will be paved.

“Freedom and Wards Creek, there were prior promises that LARP back then and we started those and did not finish those many commissions ago,” said Ayers, who said Swilling Road requires a lot of gravel and has already been widened.

County officials said that these are not the only roads the county will work on this year.

Ayers said the county has a much longer list of roads that need work that will be done in-house by county road crews.

“There is also another list of 76 miles of road,” said Ayers. “We will be doing activity with our in-house crews as well.”

Stephens County will use bond money to do that work as well, with any bond money left over at the end of this paving season being saved until the 2017 paving season to do more work.