For those who have seen the Clint Eastwood movie "Heartbreak Ridge", you might remember a comment his character utters. When asked by a colonel what he thinks of a particular situation Gunny Highway responds, "it's a real cluster *^^* " The term that many a GI has applied to a messed up situation.
Some folks might get upset at this, but I think that term could apply to this project as well.
The city has spent over $3 million alrady and now the project is on hold for possibly 3-4 years.
One stumbling block was the Southern Star pipeline. I remember a resident of Monticello bringing info about that to the council and he was basically told it was no big problem. And, at one meeting was told it was not germaine to the discussion that was going on at that time.
Now, we know the negotiations with them took quite some time and will cost the city approximately $1.3 million to pay for the relocation of the pipeline (in current dollars). What will be the cost when it actually happens?
Then there are those temporary easements. Does the city really think the residents will give them a free ride when those expire in 2010? Estimates are that it would cost about $250K to renew those in 2010.........but the project will probably be held up beyond then............so what will be the real cost at that time? Also, will the project really cost the city $6 million dollars 4 years from now? Or will inflation add to that?
Now the city has to spend money for restoration for paving, street lights that were disconnected etc etc.
A nice paved two lane like the residents originally wanted would have cost a lot less. Methinks that is what the residents originally wanted.
Now, the city also bought two houses. With the delay in the project, yours truly thought that renting one of them would be a way to recoup some of the funds. Figuring the one house could be rented for $2500 - $3500/month that could be $30K - $42K/year. Subtracting a 10% fee to a real estate company to manage the property the city, over 4 years would get quite a bit more than they are going to get now from that property. Here's the kicker. Both houses are scheduled to be gone in less than 30 days. And the house I was thinking of for rental has been completely stripped out by Habitat for Humanity. Now all of that would have been fine if the project was on schedule. Once the city found out that there was going to be a delay that could have been a nice way to recoup some monies. Could have paid for the restoration. Needless to say, obviously nobody thought of that. Seems to me like that was poor economic foresight.
