The start of the Southeast Area Reconstruction project in Clearwater may have to wait a little longer.

 

In late March, the council awarded the bid to Molitor Excavating at a price of $834,575.34. 

 

But that isn’t the end of the story. Councilmen Richard Petty and Vern Scott had questions about the project and voted against awarding the bid.

 

As it turns out, in order for the bid to be awarded, it requires at least a 4/5ths vote. So the 3-2 vote is invalid.

 

At Monday’s city council meeting, council members had another discussion about issues regarding the project.

 

Councilman Petty began with drainage design questions, which has been the main issue with the project. He asked Engineer Joe Pelawa from Bolton & Menk about whether calculations had been done for water runoff on private property. He spoke about a previous project.

 

“When Porter Street got redone, we didn’t accommodate  for the runoff that was going down the hill to the holding pond, to the point of we ended up with a lawsuit...,” he said.

 

He said the Southeast project will also have runoff going down the hill. He wondered whether it would cause more erosion to one of the properties on Porter Circle.

 

“Basically the same water that goes there now, will go there when the street is done,” said Pelawa.

 

Pelawa also explained how the project would channel water more or less to where it’s already headed, so there wouldn’t be additional water diverted onto people’s properties. He also said some of the water on Porter Street would end up in a drainage pond on T.O. Plastics property, which the city has a drainage easement for already.

 

Petty asked about potential runoff problems on Spring Street near the cul de sac that was created during the Hwy. 24 bridge project. Some of the driveways were lower than the road.

 

“We dont want the driveway to act as a spillway,” he said.

 

Pelawa said they have already taken that into consideration.

 

“We’re lowering the road about a foot because there are quite a few driveways where the house actually sits lower than the road,” he said.

 

He said they may also have to create a four-inch lip at the driveways to keep the water in the street.

 

There were also questions drainage at the Bittersweet apartments parking lot and the reason for widening Bittersweet to 40 feet.

 

Pelawa said that is being done because trucks continue to use the road, even though they aren’t supposed to. The T.O. Plastics loading dock empties onto Bittersweet Drive.

 

“We’re just trying to accommodate it because we know what happens,” he said. “We don’t want to undersize it and have them driving over curbs.”

 

“What happens if the council decides not to have truck traffic there,” asked Scott?

 

“Then you better have a nice discussion with T.O. Plastics and tell them they can’t drive trucks down there,” said Pelawa.

 

Late last year after open house meetings with residents, the council agreed not to go through the expense of installing a new stormwater system as part of the project. The cost for the system would have added well over $240,000 to the project, not including much of the construction work.

 

Vern Scott, who wasn’t on the council at the time, said he was at the open house and voiced his concerns then. Monday he said he wouldn’t go along with the project design. 

 

“I’m not happy with this. We’re just putting a big bandaid on this,” he said. “We should be directing this water to a certain place.”

 

Since Councilman Wayne Kruchten was not at Monday’s meeting, the council didn’t take a vote. They will try again at a special meeting scheduled for 8:30 a.m. on April 17.