MONDAY APRIL 5TH MITCHELL COUNTY COMMISSIONERS MEETING

Mitchell County Commissioners

Monday, April 4, 2016

By Terry Bailey

The Mitchell County Commissioners conducted their regularly scheduled weekly meeting Monday, April 4. All Commissioners as well as the County Clerk were present.

Larry Heidrick was present to give the Commissioners an update on the activities of the Rural Fire District #1 Firefighters as they responded to a call for help in fighting the Anderson Creek fire in Barber County. Heidrick, Tom Deneke, Eric LaCoe and Matt File arrived in Medicine Lodge around 7:00 last Thursday night and were in the field firefighting on Friday and Saturday. They returned home late Saturday night. Aaron Lacoe and Tim Bell took additional equipment to the fire on Friday and spent all day Saturday in the field. They gained invaluable experience as they assisted in fighting the largest grass fire in Kansas history.

Almost two hours of the meeting was taken up with discussions with the Schwab-Eaton engineers. Stuart Porter, local Schwab-Eaton engineer and Brad Fagan from the Manhattan office were present to discuss necessary changes to bridge engineering and construction in Mitchell County. Porter said that when he started years ago, the rules and regulations were minimal. Since that time, the policies and procedures mandated by State and Federal guidelines now fills a large three ring binder. Activities that at one time were considered common sense, matter of fact issues, now are addressed by pages of required verbiage.

The net result of the changing required procedures and activities is that things that used to be somewhat voluntary are now required with little local choice of whether or not to include these procedures into the local bridge engineering plans. Common sense judgment and reasoning are no longer sufficient. Increased fear of liability from ignoring the small details dictate that if the rules say if must be done, it must be done. Ignoring this could result in great liability.

The engineers provided numerous examples of almost ridiculous but very much required and mandatory, requirements. One such instance was the requirement that one bridge construction project have a rain gauge and that the gauge be read and recorded every day at a specific time regardless of whether or not it rained or if work was on going.

One of the most sobering facts was that with the new required engineering details mandated by the new rules and regulations, the current $4,000 for bridge engineering could very easily balloon to $11,000 to $12,000 per bridge. The end result is that taxes will have to be raised in order to affored building and replacing bridges in Mitchell County.

Considerable time was given to the possibility of having the County take over some of the mandated duties. With the County performing them, the Schwab-Eaton bill could be reduced somewhat. One example might be the required signage on the approaches to bridge construction. If the County assumed that duty, Schwab-Eaton would not have to include that in their work.

In final action for the meeting, the Commissioners voted to exchange $99,642 in Federal transportation money for $89.677 in State money. While the end result is less dollars, the ability to spend them with more flexibility is the overall payoff.

Other News

Beloit, KS 67420, USA