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Bidding process clogging township sewer project
Some township residents will have to wait longer than planned for a sewer project.
Phase 2 of the South Struthers Interceptor Sewer project that will take water to a waste plant on Struthers Road is delayed, said Bill Coleman, office manager for the Mahoning County Sanitary Engineer.
Bids for the second phase, which would extend service to Luteran Lane, James Street, Poland Center Drive and part of U.S. Route 224, were received in late July. Construction was expected to begin this fall.
“[The problem] isn’t with the bids themselves, it’s with the contract language that we put it out to the bidders. There are no problems with the bids received,” Coleman said.
Coleman said the Mahoning County Prosecutor’s office will make a recommendation that will then be given to county commissioners.
He said commissioners could reject the current bids and authorize an immediate re-bid, setting back construction into late winter, or they could wait and re-bid it next year, and construction would begin next spring.
The estimated cost is $2.4 million, and the project was broken into three separate contracts for bidders, he added.
Phase 1 serves Struthers and Kennedy roads and part of U.S. 224 and was completed in September.
Township Administrator Jim Scharville said residents have already started calling and asking about the second phase.
“We were hoping to get it done by the end of this year because we were behind on the other [phase],” he said.
Once the sewer is installed, residents have six months to tie into the new system.
Scharville said information about the sewer project, guidelines for low-interest loans and a list of licensed installers to connect to the sewer will be available at the township building on Dobbins Road when the project begins.
In Mahoning County, it costs $1,300 for a three-bedroom, single-family dwelling to tap in to the sewer, and that cost rises as the number of bedrooms increases, a county representative told The Vindicator earlier this year.
The representative also said previously that the metered, water-consumption rate is $6.60 per 1,000 gallons of usage plus a fixed monthly rate per customer of $5.75.