This summer's planned upgrade of the traffic lights at West Market and 12th streets in Pottsville has cost the city a little more green.
A bigger engineering bill forced city council Monday night to approve spending $38,847.13 in federal Community Development Block Grant funds for the project.
In April, city Administrator Thomas A. Palamar said the total cost of the project was $268,004.20. But that's gone up, Palamar said Monday.
The project is being funded in part by a state Automated Red Light Enforcement grant, Palamar said. "The addition of that ARLE money precipitated a lot more engineering for the project. There was a lot more engineering work that was required, significantly more. Our original estimate for engineering work was $30,200. And the total now came out to about $80,000," Palamar said.
When Palamar learned this, he reviewed the city's CDBG accounts to see if any funding was available. He found funds from two sources:
- The 2008 CDBG account, where $8,847.13 was left over from a project to beautify the sidewalk area bordering the former 15-by-30-foot hole in the parking lot of Richard B. Ryon Insurance Co. and Century 21 Ryon Real Estate.
- The 2011 CDBG account, via which the city council was planning to pave additional parking spaces at Gen. George A. Joulwan East Side Park.
"Instead of paving it, we'll use stone so it will cost us less," Palamar said. So the city was able to draw $30,000 from that project for the traffic signal.
Total cost of the traffic light project is now $306,851.33 and the city is financing it with $148,847.13 in federal Community Development Block Grant funds and $158,004.20 in state Automated Red Light Enforcement grant funds, Palamar said.
The city hired Kuharchik Construction Inc., Exeter. The city is planning to install four new traffic poles with overhead signal lights, install four pedestrian signals and curb cuts to accommodate wheelchair users.
"It will be done by September," Palamar said. In other matters at Monday's meeting, Palamar said council learned a contractor it hired last month to do line painting was not an eligible bidder.
So at Monday's meeting, council passed a resolution to void the $3,434.60 bid from Midlantic Marking and hire the next lowest bidder, Interstate Road Management, which bid $4,087.17.