McADOO — Portions of six roads will be repaved in Kline Township this year.
Meeting in a special session Friday, the township supervisors voted unanimously to award a paving contract to Franzosa Trucking, Hazleton, to pave North Street in Kelayres, part of Snyders Avenue in McAdoo Heights, three sections of Tresckow Road, three sections of Silverbook Road, two sections of Haddock Road and Kelshaw Street in Haddock for $103,649.
The supervisors reviewed the bids, which were somewhat complicated because options included in the bids for additional roads and whether the township or the contractor would pick up the paving materials. If the township would pay for the materials, they would save on paying tax on it because municipalities are exempt from paying sales tax.
After opening all the bids, the supervisors recessed for about 20 minutes to calculate the bids and determine the low bid.
Franzosa’s combined base and alternate bids if the township picked up the material would have been $108,000.
Supervisor Dale Wesner, chairman of the board, said the supervisors decided to accept the bid in which Franzosa would pick up the materials.
“In the alternate bid, we didn’t include how much material,” Wesner said. “There was no way for them (the four firms) to give us an accurate price, so we just went with the bid in which they handled everything.”
While Franzosa bid the materials on the roads in the alternate bid, M&J Excavation, Coyngham, submitted a base bid of $158,174, and noted $62,400 could be deducted if the township picked up the material.
Since the supervisors knew how much material was in the base bid, they could figure out what the material would cost.
“We calculated if we picked up the material the contract would still be about $150,000,” Wesner said.
The other two bidders on the base job, which Franzosa will build, were Barletta Materials, Tamaqua, $115,663; and M&J Paving, Bloomsburg, $133,203.87.
The optional roads included in the bids were three sections of Haddock Road, Bruno Avenue and Walsh Avenue, also in Haddock, and six sections of Silverbrook Road.
The bids on the optional work were Barletta, $86,894; M&J, $88,436; Franzosa, $97,744 and Northeast, $121,578.
The option to work on other roads was included in the event the bids came in under the $100,000 the township is using for the project, which is a 1.625 percent Pennsylvania Infrastructure Bank loan that comes through the state Department of Transportation.
“The interest rate went up to 1.75 percent,” Wesner said. “But we were grandfathered in because we did the paperwork for that loan in November before the interest rate went up.”
North Street is the first street in Kelaryes to be paved since the supervisors took a $650,000 loan in 2008 to pave all of the streets in Kelayres and McAdoo Heights.
They have been paving Tresckow Road in sections over the last few years.
The supervisors are looking for more money they can dedicate to road improvements.
“We are also looking for ways how to reduce our long-term debt and put that money into roads so they are a lot more stable,” Wesner said.
On another matter, the supervisors voted to change the date of the monthly meeting in June. The meeting will be held at 7 p.m. June 6.
Wesner said the date was changed because of “supervisors’ availability.”
The May meeting will be held at 7 p.m. Monday.