Parish President Rick Nowlin declared a state of emergency on May 29 to purchase materials for maintenance and repair of public roads as a result of the inability of its suppliers to deliver in a timely fashion. This will stay in effect for a period of 30 days unless terminated earlier by the Parish.
According to the document (SEE BELOW) this created a severe safety hazard for the users of the Parish’s roads. The Parish purchases Winn rock, crushed concrete, stone and gravel under annual contracts. However, the vendor of certain materials is unable to deliver them in a timely fashion. The Parish has an immediate need for these materials to maintain its roads and provide safe transit for its citizens.
The Director of the Parish Department of Public Works and the Parish Purchasing Agent are authorized to undertake any activity they deem necessary to purchase alternative materials subject to available funds in the budget.
said they maintain roads,thats a joke .And why would you rely on one
contractor ? if you need a job done fast you should have someone else
on stand by.
Try awarding contracts based on “best value” instead of lowest bidder
I agree!!
I don’t believe this is the site to be on bashing the parish workers. I think that’s the bash page called fix the Natchitoches parish roads.
I want asphalt to repair my road, Johnson Chute. That is what my road is made of and that is what I want it repaired with. I paid more for my property because of paved asphalt road and I want it repaired to the original condition.
If you would teach your road grader operators to pull the rock out of what should be the ditches on the side of the gravel roads, they would have enough “materials” to surface the roads, and you wouldn’t have to declare an emergency. Also the water could drain down the ditches and not wash ruts in the road surface creativing washboards and pot holes.
Totally agree!!!
I posted before I was supervisor of a road maintenance crew for a large timber company. My grader operators knew what they were doing. NOT to say our parish operators don’t also know. I can say my guys pulled roads out of the ditches many times. Now, I have to add, our roads never got in this bad of shape. We actually maintained our roads, year after year. So, it is unfair to compare our roads to Natchitoches Parish’s roads in their current condition.
Some of the comments are correct. But, do any of you know this is not being done? I haven’t been out with our parish crews, so I don’t know. Maybe they are pulling gravel from the ditches already. But our roads have too long been neglected, under the old Police Jury system which is responsible for this mess in the first place. I understand there are over 1,000 miles of parish roads…I think that’s the amount. That’s a lot of roads to maintain.