New Castle evaluated the streets and ranked them on a scale from one to 10, one being the worst and 10 being the best. The top 20 worst streets were compiled into a list for resurfacing purposes.

The original estimated cost for resurfacing the roads in question came in at $1.4 million, according to New Castle Clerk-Treasurer Christy York.

York said that the city’s street maintenance fund had around $500,000 in it; however, that total was doubled after New Castle applied for $500,000 in matching funds from the state’s Community Crossroads Matching Grant Program.

York said the grant has been crucial with respect to funding the city’s road resurfacing budget.

“The matching is a great thing! Without that there’s no way we could do all of this,” York said. “We have some pretty bad streets in this city.” 

New Castle received three bids for the planned street resurfacing work; they all came in under the projected cost of $1.4 million.

Milestone Contractors, the company currently working on Broad Street, submitted the lowest bid at $959,993. E&B Paving submitted a bid for $1,233,803, and All-Star Paving submitted a bid of $1,088,070.

York said the the next step in the process will be to review the bids and make sure each covers all 20 streets and that they meet bid specifications.

Once a bid is selected, the company involved will have from now until the end of the paving season in 2018 to complete the project. Paving season varies because of the weather, but usually runs from April to October. 

The Board of Works will announce which bid has been selected during the group’s next meeting at 10 a.m. Aug. 7. That meeting will be held in council chambers on the second floor of the city’s municipal building, 227 N. Main St., New Castle.