The transferring of debris collected following Imelda in Orange County could start being taken to Newton County in the next week. The Commissioners Court approved on Tuesday the recommendation of Emergency Management Coordinator Joel Ardoin to have Republic Services haul the debris to Newton County.
Republic Services will charge the county seven dollars per cubic yard to haul the roughly 65,500 cubic yards of debris to the Golden Triangle Landfill in Newton County. The cost will be approximately $458,900. The Republic bid was a $1.44 less per cubic yard than Waste Management’s. Ashbritt will oversee the transfer with Tetra Tech monitoring the operation.
A contract was awarded Tuesday to Scarborough Construction to do repairs to the Precinct Two Commissioner’s office building on Highway 62 in Mauriceville. Commissioner Theresa Beauchamp was very happy with the approval of the contract to get her office reopen.
The building was badly damaged in the flooding of Harvey over two years ago. Scarborough submitted the low bid of $138,948 and is expected to start the repairs on the building in the next week or two. The repairs will include installing a new roof on the building.
Insurance claims on the previous building were for $107,694. County Judge John Gothia indicated there were unused funds from other insurance claims after Harvey to cover the difference from the Scarborough bid to do the repairs.
Maintenance Director Kurt Guidry updated the Commissioners that all the sheet rock is up on the inside of the Raymond Gould Community Center in Vidor. The painting of the walls will start as early as Wednesday of this week and should be finished by next week. Early voting for the March primaries will be done in the Community Center in Vidor.
Claiborne West Park’s office building has new sheet rock installed. Finishing work will take a little longer on the inside of the office. Renovations are just about completed on one of the park’s pavilions and repairs to a second pavilion should begin this week. The contractor repairing the chimneys on the pavilions is expected to start work on Wednesday.
The Commissioners Court approved a request from the Orangefield Water Supply Corporation (OWSC) for the county to sponsor grant funding from the Texas Department of Agriculture. General Manager Jason Engle with the OWSC said they are a non-tax entity and thus need sponsorship for any kind of grant application.
The grant funds will be used to do several much needed projects for the OWSC. The exact amounts of the grant were not clear because of changes in the grant program. Historically the grants are for around $275,000, but can be as high as $500,000.
The county’s Management Information Systems (MIS) Department will partner with Lamar State College Orange and their internship program within the Information Technology Department. Lisa Reeves the director of the MIS Department has used the program before and was very happy with the interns used. There will be no cost to the county with this program.
-Dan Perrine, KOGT-
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