TOWNSEND — The Townsend Highway Department is finishing up paving one road this summer, with hopes of paving another if state funding comes through.
A project on Wallace Hill Road is nearing completion with funding the department received last year that came in late. If new funding comes in this year, paving Townsend Hill Road is next on the list.
Highway Superintendent Ed Kukkula said he expects to receive about $320,000 in state funding this fiscal year, down from about $420,000 for Fiscal 2013.
“It won’t be the amount we received last year. The projects we want to do will probably take the full amount, and if there is any left over we’ll carry it over until next year,” he said.
Kukkula said that it can be difficult to plan projects without knowing exactly how much state funding the town will receive, or when they will receive it.
“It becomes an issue only because if we don’t get enough money we have to wait for the next fiscal year to do or finish the job,” he said. “All in all, whatever (is released) we have to work with and do just what we are able to do with what we receive.”
Kukkula added that the high cost of road repairs means the town sometimes has to extend projects over more than one year.
“I’d like to do more, but with the cost of asphalt being so high because it’s an oil-based product, it makes it difficult to get more than a mile of road done a year,” he said.
Follow Chelsea Feinstein at Twitter.com/CEFeinstein.
