Transportation Committee discusses road signs, county barn renovations and material bids

By MICHAEL CRIMMINS
Glasgow News 1

In anticipation of the full Barren County Fiscal Court, scheduled for April 16, the Transportation Committee met in the court chambers to discuss street sign colors, the anticipated county barn renovations and approve and discuss material bids.

Usually the committee meets on the Monday before the Tuesday court meeting but they instead opted to meet on Friday, April 12, with Tim Coomer, committee chair and county magistrate for District 4, being the only committee member present physically — Magistrate Ronnie Stinson called into the meeting.

On the special-called agenda was discussion of “private roads and name signs.” Currently all road signs across the 500-square-mile county are green; whether they are privately up kept or under the county’s jurisdiction.

According to Coomer this has caused some confusion, specifically with people who may not realize they are on a private road. As a result Coomer suggested changing to a blue, or some non-green color, in order to make it easily distinguishable to buyers and new road department employees alike.

“The sad part of this whole ordeal is that we’ve got people that buy houses on roads they think are in the county…because all the signs look the same,” Coomer said. “People are sold houses and they think ‘why isn’t the county taking care of this road?’ So what we’re wanting to do is change the color [of the street signs].”

“If we go into a private road with a pothole and [scrap] it all out then we would be responsible and we’re not going to go there,” Coomer added.

The changing of signs, which would work retroactively as well, Coomer said, would cost less than $3,000 or $6,700 depending on the size and type of signs they decided to go with. County Road Department Supervisor Jamie DeGroft informed the collective that Hart County has implemented a similar distinction.

Towards the end of the discussion Tim Durham, who is not on the committee but a magistrate representing District 3, spoke up on the issue of county versus private roads.

“I think you got to be easy on how you state, as a representative of this county, that we’re not going to do this or that,” Durham said. “It’s just hard for me to say we’re not going to do something to a taxpayer of Barren County.”

In the end the change was recommended for discussion at the full  court meeting.

Once that discussion concluded the committee turned their attention to renovations of the roads department building — dubbed the County Barn. This is a continuation of the discussions that came into focus on Feb. 29 after employees voiced concerns about the “unsafe workplace.”

According to Coomer the bid package included things such as adding drains to the floor, heating and widening some office doors to comply with the ADA. Due to some changes, primarily in the electrical category that changed the price of the overall bid, no action was taken as the committee did not have the updated bid that included the new pricing.

Originally some discussions included renovating the barn to use for storage and build a new one close by but Coomer said they are no longer discussing building new. Deputy Judge-Executive Garland Gilliam mentioned the renovations might be moved to the Building and Property Committee.

The committee also opened a plethora of sealed bids including road oil, hot and cold mix, road tiles and they discussed getting their own fuel tank for the county barn.