Allen County crews began mowing along the county’s 1,000-plus miles of roads Tuesday.
The past three years, because of tight budgets, Bill King, director of Public Works, fielded partial mowing crews that mainly dealt with intersections.
This year’s more comprehensive mowing was ordered because brush and young trees are springing up in road ditches.
“We need to deal with them” before they get a foothold, King said.
He brought on three summer temporary workers so seven mowers — three with a 10-foot cut, a 15-footer and three boom mowers — could be dispatched each day. Two other temps are driving trucks and a sixth is working at the landfill.
When the initial mowing is complete — a single pass along each roadside — King said crews would start over and the second time around would mow to property owners’ fences.
That will send the county into fall and winter with road right of ways as clean as they have been since 2007. If fuel prices remain as high as they are, in the $3.80 a gallon range for highway gasoline, mowing may have to be curtailed again next year, he cautioned.
COMMISSIONERS approved Dispatch Director Angie Murphy’s request to purchase a 2005 Chevrolet pickup truck being replaced in the Sheriff’s Department.
The pickup has been driven 125,000 miles and will be sold for $2,500. It will be used to ferry 911 dispatchers to training sessions and other meetings.
“We’ve been having to borrow a vehicle from Bill (King),” said Murphy.
Commissioners dismissed an inquiry about sale of the home health office just south of Allen County Hospital, vacated when home health and hospice moved to 501 N. State.
Commissioner Dick Works thought it better to retain ownership of the building until a new hospital is built and “we have a better idea of what is going to happen” with the hospital and support structures.
