Highway Supe, Town Board Unable to Meet Over Highway Equipment

After directing Councilman Jim Wooten last week to reach out to Highway Superintendent Gio Woodson, so the town could use Highway Department equipment in saving money on a project, town leaders decided have instead to bid the project out privately.

Highway department equipment, according to State Highway Law, "shall be used by the town superintendent in such manner and in such places in such towns as he shall deem best."

After Supervisor Sean Walter questioned why some past work the highway department has done for the town (the two budgets are separate) took too long - "We'd have been better off to get a private contractor to do it," Walter said -

The project, headed by Councilman George Gabrielsen, was clearing and grading space for a 200-space parking lot, to go alongside newly constructed baseball fields, on the north side of Enterprise Park at Calverton on Route 25. After conflicts with the state Department of Transportation kept the fields closed last year, Gabrielsen said he would like to have the fields open for use this spring.

The expected additional cost - which could range anywhere from $60,000 to $75,000 - should have the benefit of quicker completion, said Town Engineer Ken Testa. In a separate project at EPCAL, the town decided that rather than use the highway department's excavator, it would rent one out at a cost not to exceed $8,500.

Woodson said he wasn't 100 percent sure that he would have been able to complete the project by Memorial Day himself, though it was a possibility.

The Highway Department superintendent and supervisor have butted heads over the allocation of Woodson's dollars. Walter and the Town Board set Woodson's budget, however Woodson must approve budget transfers over a certain dollar amount with the town board.

Walter - saying his obligation is to taxpayers, not Woodson - has as of late refused to grant Woodson's requests, prompting the second-term superintendent to use his equipment elsewhere. Woodson has said that as an elected official like any other town board member, he is accountable to voters, and as such should be given the autonomy of deciding what to do with his own budget.