Our Department of Public Works is making good progress this year in street repaving. In total, department director Greg Huffman expects to be able to pave 7 miles this season. This is an improvement over past years when sometimes the township was only able to repave 1 mile of road. Given that we have 120+ miles of residential road, and on average roads need to be repaved every 20 years, the Township needs to repave at least 6 miles a year to stay on top of the game. Raiding the road department budget to pay for other township services is exceptionally short-sighted, and something I am opposed to.
Last year, we spent about $400,000 on street repaving, just barely hitting our average of 6 miles. But surprisingly, the leaf pickup for fall 2006 cost over $600,000. I was stunned when I saw the report that said we spent more on a non-capital service than we did on our infrastructure.
I know that leaf collection is an important service to our tree-laden community. Our residents expect it, and we will continue to provide that service. But I also think that we need to figure out more efficient ways of providing that service. I believe that many of the problems at the Township result from failing to look beyond what has always been done. We have grown from a small rural township to an urban community, and yet some of our practices have not changed, thus leading to inefficiencies.
Improving our fall leaf pickup service to provide quality service in a cost efficient manner will be looked at in the next few years. There are a variety of ideas that we are looking at, and we always welcome resident input.
That wraps up this latest installment. As always, I encourage emails to trusteedeedee@yahoo.com.
Sincerely,
