‘I don’t walk their walk’ – Highway Superintendent Cramped by Town Council

By Matt Freeze — 

Town of Owego Highway Superintendent Mike Roberts has been frustrated with roadblocks set up by the town board regarding his projects over the last three and a half years in office. 

“This is typical of what happens to me,” Roberts said. “One of the board members sent an email: ‘I’m for holding off on any new paving projects for 2025.”

Roberts recalled the recent board decision to hold off on three paving projects that included Academy Street in front of the BOCES facility, as a board member was concerned about impacting students.

“So, I reached out to the company and said, ‘Hey, could you do it on a Saturday,’” Roberts said. “They said they could do it on a Saturday. I sent that to the board.”

He still doesn’t want to do that road, Roberts said as he gestured to the email.

“It’s been that way since I got here,” he said. “I’m an outsider, so I don’t walk their walk. I’m not their puppet.”

Roberts pointed out that the Town of Owego has 200 miles of roads.

Doing simple math, taking into account the average life of a good road being 10 years, at least 20 miles of road need to be done each year to keep up, he said.

“I don’t make up these rules — I only have a little over $2 million — it’s just the reality,” Roberts said. “You can barely do a mile of hot mix (asphalt) for a million dollars. So, that means I’d only be able to do two miles a year.”

Roberts clarified that he’s using round numbers.

“(Hot mix) is what they used to do, and that’s why they’re so far behind,” he said. “I had to come up with something cheaper; we’ve been averaging 20 to 25 miles a year over the last three years.”

To do that, Roberts said he’s consistently spoken with three area vendors to look at the roads and give him proposals, and added that there’s only one local hot mix company in town.

“It could be a monopoly; I don’t know,” he said. “Anyway, I get proposals on each road — each road is different, so each road doesn’t necessarily get the same process. It depends on the road.”

There are a lot of factors that go into it, he continued.

“There isn’t anybody that knows everything about roads and paving, but I rely on these people to give me input,” he said. “I can decipher BS.”

Roberts said a lot of the roads he’s done have been a cold mix, which is more affordable, and in his opinion, provides a better end result in this area because it’s more flexible than hot-mix asphalt.

“It’s the polymers and stuff they put in it — it’s just a better product for this environment,” he said. “If you take a look at some of the hot mix roads that were done prior to when I got here, a year later — look out Waits Road — it was full of cracks a year later.”

Roberts said to go look at the cold mix roads he’s done: “there’s no cracking.”

The cold mix process involves a mix of oil and stone through an industrial mixer and then run through paving machines.

The town has also used what they call a “train,” or essentially a very large rototiller, to grind the road surface and part of the base and mix it with two-inch stone, then compact it back down into a new road surface.

Morning Times readers in the Valley may recognize this process as full-depth reclamation, or FDR, as mentioned with the roadwork in Athens Township on Westbrook and Erin roads.

“It’s saved us so much money — you’re getting two or three miles, almost three; if that was hot mix, it’d be millions,” Roberts said. “Even DOTs are using different processes now because of the cost.”

Roberts brought attention to Main Street in Apalachin as an example.

“That’s a cold mix process with a micro layer over that,” he said. “I actually got an international award for that road, combining the two different processes. I think it’s awesome, and it’s going on three years,” adding, “I did that in my first year, and there’s very little cracking, if any; it’s just superficial cracking because the micro layer gets hard and cracks because there’s a concrete mortar in it.”

When it comes to road projects being turned down by the town council, Roberts said he feels bad for the residents.

“It’s a shame because I’m just trying to get these things done; the residents deserve it,” he said as he picked up a pile of spreadsheets outlining road projects. “No highway superintendent has spreadsheets for paving projects — it’s unheard of. I give this to (the council) and show it to them, and they still say I go over budget.”

Roberts said he’s been working on a document to get all his numbers exactly right down to the penny, that he hasn’t gone over budget.

“I’ve been averaging roughly $200,000 to $300,000 that I return to the budget at the end of the year,” he said. “I don’t spend my whole budget. I’ve done it for three years in a row now. The first year, I just got some graph paper and started a handwritten one. Everything is here: project type, aggregate costs, and everything.”

Roberts said he just doesn’t understand the pushback he’s gotten from board members.

Roberts also pointed out that with his background of 40 years as a mechanic, he’s happy to say the town hasn’t wasted any money on paying other garages to repair DPW vehicles.

“I’ve sourced out used engines with warranties; we’ve put two or three engines in since I’ve been here,” he said. “We’ve got two good mechanics here now — I mean, really good. The one mechanic, I don’t know why he’s here when he could be making a lot more money somewhere else, you know?”

Roberts gave an example that when he came into the position, one of the DPW trucks had been sitting at a mechanic with a $20,000 or $30,000 bill waiting to be picked up, only for that truck to have to go back for more repairs shortly after that.

“I think we’ve done one hell of a good job,” Roberts said of the town’s road crew.

Looking to the future and having lost the primary in June against former highway superintendent Mark Clark, Roberts said he isn’t even looking to run a write-in campaign at this point or file as an independent.

“I’m not even trying to politic right now; I’m just trying to tell you what I’ve been up against,” he said. “I just feel it’s totally unwarranted. We’ve accomplished a lot.”

Roberts said he and his deputy, Hank Hines, typically start going through road lists for the following year’s projects in November and categorize them in terms of importance.

“I try to fit it in the budget; things don’t happen overnight, but what kills me is I have all that money in my budget, and then I still have to go in front of them for an agreement to spend the money,” he said. “I won’t be here to prove it, but all the roads we’ve done are going to have at least 10 years of life expectancy.”

Roberts said one of the things he’s most proud of during his time as superintendent is reducing the number of dirt roads in the town.

“It’s cheaper to bite the bullet and redo them with an FDR,” Roberts said of dealing with dirt roads, which often soak up a large amount of money and still need regular grading and materials added.

Some roads, though, such as Holmes or Bolls Hill, are just always going to have problems due to water.

“There are underground streams, and we have a lot of freeze/thaw cycles,” he said. “We go in and get rid of trees because when you’re driving around and you see a spot that’s broken up, it’s usually because of the trees that block the sun from getting in there and drying things out, and at night it just buckles.”

He said he made it a point to go around and cut back limbs to help stop that process.

At the end of the day, roads are at the mercy of what the weather is doing, he said.

Roberts said he was also pleased with being able to secure $3.2 million in grant money for bridges he got through his involvement and 20 year membership with the Binghamton Metropolitan Study Group.

(Matt Freeze is a Senior Staff Writer with the Morning Times)