Bulloch County hasn't actually spent any of the $5 million the county commissioners approved for emergency road repairs after Tropical Storm Debby to pay contractors for rebuilding dirt roads, since no contractors wanted the work at the rates offered, county Public Works Director Dink Butler reported last week.

Instead, the county's Public Works Department, which had purchased large loads of crushed stone at the time of the storm, spent a portion of the money renting additional trucks for hauling materials, and has used the county's own crews, including inmate labor, to make dirt road repairs.

"As you may remember, we had 91 roads closed at one point right after the storm," Butler told the county commissioners Sept. 17. "We're down to five: the two paved roads, Brannen Pond and Nevils-Denmark, and we have three dirt roads that are still washed out completely."

He and his department expected to have two of those last three dirt roads repaired last week and the third one this week, he said.

"So we'll have all of our roads back for safe travel for the public, hopefully by the end of next week (now this week), weather permitting," Butler said.

Meanwhile, Public Works had been notifying Bulloch County Schools staff promptly when repairs on a road were completed, so the school system could restore school bus routes, he said.

Back on Aug. 12, the commissioners unanimously approved a proposal explained by Butler and County Manager Tom Couch to shift up to $5 million to a "rapid response plan" for post-Tropical Storm Debby road repairs. The emergency reallocation included $3.75 million from Transportation Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax, or T-SPLOST, revenue and potentially up to $1.25 million from the county's general fund reserve.

The original idea was to hire earthmoving contractors to rebuild the base layers of dirt roads, leaving the county crews to do the top grading. The added workforce and equipment were meant to speed up work Butler said might otherwise take a year or more. Now, some of the repairs that have been made are temporary and will require further work later, but the dirt roads are reopened with no actual contractor help except for dump trucks rented for hauling, Butler acknowledged last week.

By renting trucks from sources such as stone quarries, Bulloch County Public Works increased its number of trucks on the road each day from the usual six or seven to about 12. But the work was done by the usual combination of regular county employees and Bulloch County Correctional Institute inmates.

"We've made a big push. We've not had a whole lot of interest in external help to help us with this," Butler told the commissioners. "We've spent a good bit of money on materials – pipes, rock. We've rented some trucks to help us haul so we can get these things done in a more timely manner. … I think we've made a lot of headway under the circumstances, in the timeframe."

Lack of response

One commissioner asked why the county hadn't been able to hire outside contractors.

Butler said he had made calls to contractors and cited, as proposed in August, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, rates, for equipment use and the Georgia Department of Transportation rates for labor. But even after improving on the GDOT labor reimbursement rates by 50%, the county was offering just $18-$22 an hour for equipment operators, he said.

"So between equipment rates by FEMA and those adjusted labor rates that I put out to a few people to give me an idea whether they would be interested, I didn't get any positive feedback," Butler said. "I think there's so much work going on in the industrial development areas and the residential development areas that they don't have to settle for something less-than. … They're all staying busy."

Nevils-Denmark repair

But a portion of the county's $5 million emergency road repair budget, specifically a portion from T-SPLOST, will go toward a major repair on Nevils-Denmark Road, a paved road, beginning with design and engineering. 

A section of the pavement, about 700 feet south of Georgia Highway 46 and not far from Nevils Elementary School, collapsed Aug. 6 when the rush of stormwater from Debby undermined a culvert, a structure somewhat like a small bridge but mostly hidden from drivers' view. 

During their Sept. 17 meeting, the commissioners unanimously approved spending up to $192,500 with the engineering consultant company Kimley-Horn and a subcontractor for engineering and design work in preparation for the repair of Nevils-Denmark Road.

This particular structure was a "double barrel box culvert, 21 feet wide and 6 feet tall," dating from 1951, so 73 years old, according to the county Engineering Department's memo for the commissioners. It had been inspected by the Georgia Department of Transportation every two years, the memo states.

After Tropical Storm Debby passed, GDOT inspectors and county staff did an emergency inspection.

"Inspections indicated that flood waters had caused scour underneath the base of the culvert, causing it to sink approximately one foot on one side and rotate slightly," the county document stated. "The GDOT Bridge Office recommended closing the road to traffic until the culvert is replaced. Due to the nature of the damage as well as the age of the existing structure, it does not appear that rehabilitation of the structure will be feasible."

Speaking to the commissioners, Assistant County Engineer Ron Nelson reported that the payment for Kimley-Horn itself had been negotiated as an hourly rate and capped, with the total not to exceed $146,000. Kimley-Horn's subconsultants would receive a lump sum of $46,500, making the maximum cost of the design and engineering $192,500.

'Expedited' schedule

Kimley-Horn is the same company that did engineering and design for the reconstruction of a portion of Brannen Pond Road, where the road over a set of pipe culverts was damaged by storm waters from Hurricane Idalia a year earlier, Aug. 30-31, 2023. After the county sought assistance from the FEMA and its Georgia state counterpart, GEMA, on that project, it finally went out for construction bids in August of this year, and that portion of Brannen Pond Road remains closed, with construction slated for completion in early 2025.

With the post-Debby restoration project on Nevils-Denmark Road, the county staff is taking a different approach while again working with Kimley-Horn, Nelson told the commissioners.

"The schedule for the delivery of the design is probably the worst part of it," he said. "But we feel like we can affect change internally as much as possible to work with Kimley Horn to get the design completed as quick as practicable to get it to a point of actually going to procurement for a construction contractor."

The current schedule shows that the county expects the design to be completed by March 31, 2025.

"So laying it completely out, full disclosure, full transparency, it's going to take six and a half months to fully design it, but (County Engineer) Brad (Deal) and I are going to do everything we can to bring it in sooner than that," Nelson said.

A construction schedule, with "similarities to Brannen Pond Road" allowing 120 days to completion, would put the expected completion date for the culvert replacement to August 2025, he said. Only then could that road segment reopen.

Once again, Kimley-Horn "will follow state/federal guidelines, as was done for the Brannen Road project, in case any FEMA or state reimbursement becomes available. However, the project schedule will be expedited …," the county Engineering Department memo states.

In other words, this time the county staff does not intend to wait for FEMA and GEMA to approve reimbursement funding before getting construction bids.

The cost of the Nevils-Denmark restoration could be comparable with that of the Brannen Pond Road project, Butler said after the meeting. The construction contract price on the Brannen Pond Road restoration is $547,801 with McLendon Enterprises, after Kimley-Horn's design fees had a $158,000 limit.

Big GEMA check

Also to last week's meeting, Butler brought an $839,393.82 check he and Emergency Management Director Corey Kemp had received on behalf of the county from GEMA as reimbursement for road repairs made after Hurricane Idalia and presented it to Finance Director Kristie King. This did not include the Brannen Pond Road project, which has yet to be completed.