Isabella Road Commission: stagnant budget a problem
by Jason Baird

The Isabella County Road Commission has been struggling with its budget throughout Michigan’s on-again, off-again winter weather.

Getting dumped on by large amounts of snow in short periods of time and massive thawing and refreezing has led the commission to use its entire winter budget.

“We’re just trying to maintain at this point, and we’re failing,” road commission spokesperson Tony Casali said.

The road commission has used and exceeded its $945,000 winter budget. Casali says the total season expenses may reach $1.3 million.

Does this mean the streets are going to be mayhem if we get another heavy snowfall? If the commission is going to continue to maintain the 1,200 miles of roadway it covers, where will it find the funding?

For starters, the commission has begun to use its springtime blacktop maintenance budget.

We’ve already used $50,000 of the blacktop maintenance budget. That figure equates to 20 percent of the spring budget, Casali said.

Cuts are being made to help stretch available money.

Less paved roads are being repaired. Less of the 700 miles of gravel roads are being bladed and scraped. “It’s around $125,000 to repair a single gravel road,” Casali said.

The commission has for the most part eliminated salt use. It switched to a mix of liquid chloride and sand. A 50/50 mix of salt and sand is used on multi-lane, high traffic roads.

“It’s a state issue. The current formula is not appropriate in terms of fixing and maintaining roads,” Casali said.

The commission is looking at buying two new county trucks. The trucks are $170,000 apiece. As a testament of the changing economy, the same truck cost $100,000 in 1998. The commission expects to only be able to afford one of the new trucks.

While prices of steel, equipment and fuel rise, among other integral components of business, the budget remains stagnant.

“I expect a real flat year. We’ve had a 4 percent decrease this year in revenue, that’s $200,000 less than last year,” Casali said.

While there is no clear-cut solution to having limited funding, job-loss seems not to be a consideration.

“The road commission went through layoffs 2 or 3 years ago, reducing the work force by 8 positions,” Casali said