The roads are rocky, but the Sunflower County Board of Supervisors and a local solar farm are trying to smooth things out.
During this past Monday’s board meeting, three representatives from Harvest Gold appeared before the county body in an attempt to haggle with the board about what might be owed for apparent damages caused by the solar farm’s contractor during construction.
Harvest Gold is in the process of closing out the large project on land adjacent to Boyer/Steiner Road, and the county has made clear that it would like to see repairs made to that road, Blaine Road and a third, Britt Road, which the company’s contractors were not supposed to be traveling on to begin with.
Harvest Gold does have a $750,000 bond to cover potential damages on Boyle/Steiner and Blaine roads, something the county had them do as part of the overall tax agreement prior to construction.
Despite the agreement made a couple of years ago with Harvest Gold, it appears that Britt Road was heavily traveled with heavy trucks during construction and some damage was done there.
Harvest Gold has agreed to do repairs on Britt Road, which includes base repairs within the state aid guidelines.
District 2 Supervisor Riley Rice said, “We need to agree as to what it’s going to take to fix those roads.”
Michael Pritchard, the project development director of Harvest Gold, told the board that the company intends on operating projects within Sunflower County for the next 30-50 years.
“We always want to be a good corporate citizen and do what we say we’re going to do. The agreement does say that we would get a pre-construction survey, we did, and we provided an agreement,” said Pritchard
County Engineer Ron Cassada told the board that Harvest Gold had originally told him it did not think the company was responsible for any damage on the roads. Cassada told the board that he has had several meetings with Harvest Gold, and a compromise had been proposed about doing base repairs on Britt Road.
This agreement is separate from the bond the county has on Boyer/Steiner and Blaine roads. Harvest Gold did provide Cassada with the scope work on Britt Road.
Cassada said that he does approve of the scope work Harvest Gold is presenting, because it is using state aid guidelines for base repairs on Britt Road. The board asked Cassada if he was aware who Harvest Gold may have as a contractor. He told the board he was not sure, but he believed that the company had spoken with different contractors.
Harvest Gold also provided Cassada with before and after images of the roads.
Cassada is not sure if Harvest Gold has marked any of the areas on Blaine or Boyer/Steiner that they may be ready to repair.
“I think Moss (the contractor) went out to mark it themselves. They couldn’t get their sub-contractor to mark it,” said Cassada.
Cassada asked Harvest Gold if the company could provide him with a schedule of stations with the width and length of the spots. He said that this would help him see what they are doing.
There is also the issue of damaged asphalt next to two different bridges on the roads in question.
District 3 Supervisor Sherry Gaston said, “I would like to see them fixed.”
Harvest Gold told Cassada at a meeting that they did not want to touch the approaches to the bridges but agreed to pay for the asphalt on Boyer/Steiner.
District 1 Supervisor Glenn Donald told the Harvest Gold representatives who were present that some bad spots on Boyer/Steiner Road may cause an accident and that may be a liability to the county.
“We made some agreements, and we were fair to you all. We catered to you all and for us to have to go back and forth about how you are going to fix the road especially Britt Road and we told you all time after time not to go down that road and everyone disregarded it,” said Donald to the Harvest Gold representatives.
District 3 Supervisor Gaston was in agreement.
“I just want Harvest Gold to live up to their commitment and put the roads back,” said Gaston.
The agreement says the board and the contractor will work out a plan to repair any damages, and if they cannot mutually agree, they will get a third-party engineer to assess the damages.
Donald said, “Let’s have a good relationship, let’s fix the road.”
Michael Bienvenu, the project manager for Harvest Gold, said, “If we caused it, we will fix it.”
Bienvenu also told the board, “Present any other location that you all feel that we need to fix. Please let us know and then we will take back the leveling approach on Britt Road.”
Cassada suggested that Harvest Gold use spray paint and mark the areas they believe they are responsible for repairing, and the board will follow-up with them.
The two parties seemed to be in agreement with the direction they are heading after Monday’s meeting.
