Lincoln Park Department of Public Works Director John Kozuh (left) addresses the City Council during the Feb. 23 meeting.
By SUE SUCHYTA
Sunday Times Newspapers
LINCOLN PARK – As cold weather and an increasing number of water main breaks throw challenges at the city, officials updated the City Council Feb. 23 on the city’s infrastructure status.
Department of Public Works Director John Kozuh presented the council with a three-year extension of its contract with R&J Enterprises of South Rockwood, which provides critical support during emergency repairs, system failures and major infrastructure improvements. The company offered to extend its 2019 contract rates, which the council approved.
Lincoln Park City Manager and Finance Director Lisa Griggs speaks to the City Council during the Feb. 23 meeting.
City Manager and Finance Director Lisa Griggs said the extreme cold and fluctuating temperatures has caused a lot of water main breaks in the city in the last two months.
She said that while leak detection technology can find the source of problems, it will not alleviate the underlying cause of the water main breaks.
“We have very old infrastructure, so, until all that’s replaced, we are going to be seeing this for the long future,” Griggs said. “As of right now, we’ve had 53 water main breaks this year, so, take that and compare it to all of last year, where we had 151, so we are not doing so well right now.”
She said renewing the contract with R&J was critical to the city, since the company will come in and provide relief for city DPW employees.
Griggs also acknowledged the potholes on Goddard and Emmons roads and said the city has submitted a grant funding request for both roads, but the process is time intensive, and even if funding is received the resultant repairs would not occur until several years from now.
“So, if we could do something to get us through to that point, I think it’s very critical,” she said. “Continuing to invest in our infrastructure is critical, and we’ve been very fortunate to receive a lot of money from the government, some in the form of loans, some in the form of grants, but we continue to look for additional grants.”
Griggs said she is working with state legislators to find funding sources, which is a time-consuming process.
“We are continuing to search for additional funds, because it is very costly,” she said. “We’ve done about 12 percent of the water mains in the city, so we have a long way to go.”