Commissioners approve purchases for Engineer's Office

Brian Haytcher, Star Beacon, Ashtabula, Ohio
·2 min read

Apr. 17—JEFFERSON — The Ashtabula County Board of Commissioners voted Tuesday to make a number of purchases for the Ashtabula County Engineer's Office at a Tuesday morning meeting.

The commissioners approved purchasing 9,200 tons of limestone for the year, with a price of $29.37 per ton, for a total contract cost of $270,204.

The county will also purchase a new truck and dump body for the Engineer's Office. The truck will be purchased from Austinburg Truck Center at a price of $138,672, and the dump body will be purchased through Concord Road Equipment, of Mentor, at a price of $98,277.92, according to the resolution.

The truck will replace a 2001 tandem-axel dump truck, which will be sold at auction in the future.

The county will participate in the Ohio Department of Transportation's road salt contract.

According to information from the Ohio Department of Transportation, the department has a cooperative purchasing program, that lets political subdivisions participate in ODOT contracts, with the advantage of being exempted from competitive bidding for those purchases.

In other business:

—Leadership at SPIRE Academy in Harpersfield have requested a letter of support from the county for a proposed ice rink at the facility, and potentially for the county to invest in the project as well, Commissioner Casey Kozlowski said.

He said when the commissioners last discussed it, there was interest in the project, but he was not in favor of contributing funds.

Commissioner J.P. Ducro said he is theoretically in favor of providing some funds for ice rink, but he would like to see more information on the project.

Kozłowski said the request has evolved over time.

—Kozlowski said the Route 534/Route 307 intersection will close starting April 29. The intersection will re-open before July 4, he said.

ODOT has been planning to replace the intersection with a roundabout for several years. According to information from ODOT, the roundabout is intended to reduce the number of crashes at intersection, 74 percent of which were caused by failure to yield, and 21 percent of which were caused by vehicles following one-another too closely.

The Harpersfield Covered bridge will be opened by the third week of May, at the latest, but will be open for emergency vehicles while the intersection is closed, Kozlowski said.