PITTSBURG, Kan. —
Public Works Director Bill Beasley told city commissioners Tuesday night that sales tax revenue collected for street repairs and improvements is coming in ahead of projections.
That additional revenue is paving the way for one of the city’s largest street repair initiatives in recent history, he said.
In 2010, when city officials proposed the quarter-cent sales tax to voters, they projected annual revenue at $486,000. Voters approved the tax in November of that year, and retailers began collecting it on April 1, 2011.
Through the end of December 2011, the tax generated $521,500. So far this year, the tax has generated $678,600. Each month, revenue generally has been between $68,000 and $75,000, but May’s receipts were especially high, at $91,500.
The additional revenue will allow city crews to repair and resurface 4.5 miles of city streets by the end of this year, Beasley said.
Crews are nearly finished with repaving 14 blocks of North Walnut Street from Fifth Street to 20th Street, including adding disabled-accessible ramps and curbing at a cost of $95,000.
Other projects recently completed include repaving streets in the Timber Hills subdivision, East 13th Street, South Street, and the access road and drive around the new water treatment plant.
“These streets were really falling apart,” Beasley said.
Work on Georgia Street will begin this week, he said. When the work is finished, the street will be paved from Memorial Drive to Kansas Street, and from Jefferson Street to Quincy Street. One section, from Kansas to Jefferson, will remain unfinished until spring so crews can work with the Department of Utilities to reconstruct a ditch and build a storm sewer.
Crews then will move to Grand Oaks, a neighborhood south of Via Christi Hospital. If time is left, crews might begin work on Water Street.
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