County awards Loop Road repair bid

Wahkiakum County commissioners accepted a bid to repair a slide on Loop Road and acted on other business when they met Tuesday.

Commissioners accepted the recommendation of Public Works Director Pete Ringen to award the contract to the low bidder, Cat Works LLC, in the amount of $257,922.

The contractor will install materials to stabilize a slope that has slid and taken out part of a lane of Loop Road.Ringen said the work will be done this year.

In other business, commissioners approved a recommendation from Ringen to amend the contract with ADR Enterprises for mowing county roads. Ringen said there is money left in the budget for a third cut on many roads because contractors bid low for the contract. The board approved spending another $4,104.92 to mow selected roads. The county budgeted $4,500 for mowing, and with the additional amount, the county will pay only $38,523.

The board rejected a claim for damages from Puget Island resident Glenn Fluckiger, who believed his car had sustained body damage aboard the ferry Wahkiakum. However, statements from others on the ferry at that time said Fluckiger's car hadn't been touched by another vehicle.

The board passed a resolution to amend 2013 budgets to add $1.395 million from grants and unexpected revenue from sale of timber of county trust timberland.

Commissioner Dan Cothren said the log market is high and that's generating the additional revenue.

"We could ride this for a while," Cothren said. He added that the export market demand is strong and that puts pressure on the domestic market. If the domestic housing market were to take off, prices would increase again.

Cothren reported that a committee meeting to work on a proposed ordinance to regulate collections of old vehicles and other junk on private property is making good progress.

"We're trying to get down to where people will buy into this," he said.

He added that a major concern with the county's lenient laws is that people can bring junk into the county and leave it on property. If that property isn't maintained and goes into foreclosure, the county would be stuck with cleanup costs.

"I haven't seen any of that at this time," commented commission Chair Blair Brady.

"It's there," Cothren said. "We're opening ourselves up if we don't put something up. We're ripe for it."

Commissioners adjourned their meeting and will reconvene today (Thursday) at 1 p.m. to discuss funding for a new county ferry with a representative of the state Department of Transportation.

Bids for construction of the ferry were higher than anticipated, and with extra costs such as revising the Puget Island ferry ramp, the county is short about $1.1 million.