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September 19, 2006

COMMISSIONERS PRESENT “WORST ROADS IN THE COUNTY” LIST

Commissioner Bernard lives on Chick-a-Dee Ct. “The worst asphalt road in the county” according to the work done by the County Manager at the direction of our Commissioners. This is where Comm. Bernard lives on Chick-a-Dee Ct.

According to the statistics prepared by the County Manager, Chick-a-Dee Ct. is .55 miles long, has 38 houses, and is in “Fair” condition. The condition is determined by the person that looked at the road—NO set guidelines or written standards were used. According to TWG sources, the County Manager and the Public Works director looked at different roads and it was their “opinion” as to what the rating was. This gives a very, very subjective (and politicized) view of how bad the road really is. Another interesting fact is that 5 of the 9 Turtle Cove Board members also live on Chick-a-Dee Ct.

To determine the “rating” of a road, a formula is used. How many businesses, houses, and/or churches are on a road, the length of the road, and the condition of the road all determine the score or rating of the road. Comm. Bernard, Comm. Johnson, and Comm. Yarbrough all said at the BOC meeting 9/11/06 that they wanted to “take the politics out of road paving and make it fair to everyone in the county.”

Below is another view of Chick-a-Dee Ct.

The recommended roads that will be submitted to DOT for LARP (Local Assistance Road Plan) must already be paved (no dirt roads are accepted in LARP). There are 26 roads on the list; 15 of these roads are in Turtle Cove (58% of the “worst roads in the county”).

It appears that not all roads in the County have been looked at and the condition of the road determined. There are approximately 399 county roads based on information provided to the TWG by the Public Works department through open records requests.
Approximately 104 of these roads have been given a subjective “road condition” rating.
It appears that every road in Turtle Cove has been reviewed and given a rating. The rest of the County roads do not have the priority of the Turtle Cove roads.

Below is a picture of Jasper St. in the Alcovy Shores neighborhood. This road is not on the list to be resurfaced because it hasn’t been “rated” yet. The resident (taxpayer) that lives in the house where the sand has been spread has a hospice patient. This resident called for over a week to have the road fixed so the home health personnel could get in and out of the driveway. The PWD came and put down sand.

This is a picture of part of Jasper St.

This picture shows where Lane St. and Covington St. intersects. The School buses, garbage trucks, and residents travel these roads daily.

LARP is wonderful thing for our county. It helps us to have 10 roads or 10 miles of roads paved each year with State money. It is our understanding that the county has to patch and repair first, then the State will do the paving.

In 2006 several roads were paved, including Runner Rd., which branches off of Chick-a-Dee Ct. This is the road where our current County Manager lives.

Intersection of Runner Rd and Chick-a-Dee Ct.

SPLOST funds will be used to have several roads paved, including Parrot (where Comm. Bernard’s campaign manager lives) and Mourning Dove Ct., which has already been paved. Based on the recommended LARP list submitted to the BOC at their meeting, we also suspect that Comm. Johnson’s road will be paved before the end of 2009.

TWG will have the “LARP Recommended List” on its website at www.taxdogs.com/larp091106.htm. Let us know your opinion of the roads submitted, and send us pictures of your road if you think it is worse than the ones to be submitted.

TWG also wants to take the “politics” out of road paving. There are many other roads in the county worth consideration.

TWG
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