A legislative study committee tasked with examining services provided by counties, along with available revenue sources, met yesterday in Pierre.
The first two speakers discussed roads and transportation, which is one of the largest expenses for counties. Due to limited revenues, many counties are forced to put off maintaining roads. Greg Vavra, who is a South Dakota Local Transportation Assistance Program Manager in Brookings, says deferred maintenance is costly in terms of dollars and road condition. He told the committee that when a road is not chip sealed every 6-7 years, its life cycle is diminished by half, and for every dollar not spent on maintenance, it costs 6 dollars in construction costs. He added that many counties are not keeping up on road maintenance.
Vavra also told the committee that counties simply do not have the money in their budget for road maintenance. He says a study was done in Lake County, and to keep roads in “as like” condition, $1.2 million would need to be added to the maintenance budget each year. To move some of the “fair” roads to “good” and “good” to “excellent”, it would be $2.6 million annually in a county budget of $3.6 million total. Vavra said it’s not doable at this time for counties.
The Study Committee on County Funding and Services will meet again this summer.