As rural roads and bridges continue to crumble, local officials seek ways to fund much-needed projects.
The Cattaraugus County Legislature may decide tomorrow if it wants to pull nearly $4 million from the fund balance and put it into ten road repairs, scattered around the county. The current budget already calls for spending nearly $3 million on the road network.
"Some people living on them but they are not necessarily heavily populated. So, you try to keep up the major, more traveled thoroughfares better than some of the fringe roads that don't get much traffic," said Legislator Joe Snyder.
"But those poor people that live on those (less-traveled) roads I don't know if they will ever see their roads fixed."
Snyder says the county needs to spend around $20 million a year on keeping up the county's roads and bridges and buildings and the money just isn't there, once the state mandates take their fiscal bite. With no desire to override the tax cap and the high costs of borrowing to do road and bridge repairs, trimming the accumulated surplus because the choice of some.
