County applies for grant for road sign replacement

BY BROOKS TAYLOR

Mt. Pleasant News

Out with the old and in with the new.

Henry County?s engineering department is taking the adage seriously as the county is applying for a $10,000 grant to replace about 200 roadside signs in the county.

?It is the first wave (of sign replacement),? reported County Engineer Jake Hotchkiss at Tuesday?s county board of supervisors meeting. ?We will be targeting stop signs, no passing zone and stop sign ahead signs.?

Hotchkiss said another 200 signs could be replaced later. ?We want to keep doing this and taking advantage of the program.?

Regulatory and school signs can be replaced under rules and regulations of the program, but Hotchkiss said school signs will not be replaced this year.

The signs have to be replaced within 180 days of receipt of the grant and county employees will handle the maintenance on replacing the signs.

Hotchkiss said plans for reconstruction of Winfield Avenue to the U.S. Highway 218 overpass bridge have been submitted to the Iowa Department of Construction. ?We did make the February (bid) letting,? he noted.

In other miscellaneous and construction news, Hotchkiss said rock crushing at the county quarry would be finished this week. The county?s new territory shed on Oasis Avenue is completed except for ?punch list? items.

New fuel pumps, Hotchkiss stated, have been installed and are being used at the engineering department headquarters.

Road maintenance by the secondary roads department last week included mixing salt and sand for future use on roads this winter; hauling sand to the shop for snow removal operations; working on signs; a ditching project on 310th Street and south of Salem; and continuing bump grinding rough spots on roads.

In other agenda items, supervisors signed a bridge design contract with Calhoun-Burns and Associates, Inc. for a bridge located on county road J20 east of Lowell.

Supervisor Greg Moeller also was appointed as the board?s representative on the Southeast Iowa Regional Planning Commission board.

Supervisors meet again in regular session Thursday at 9 a.m., in the Henry County Courthouse.