Town to shuffle funds to pay its share of crumbling bridge fix

The Town of Saukville committed its share of funds for an almost $800,000 bridge reconstruction project on Cedar Sauk Road between Highway I and Maple Road this month.

Twenty percent of the project’s price-tag, or $158,900, will be paid through the town’s general budget, while the remaining $631,600 will be covered by a Bipartisan Infrastructure Law grant, a federal program administered by the state, Town Engineer Matt Stephan of Cedar Corp. said.

The town initially tried to use its funds received from the American Rescue Plan Act to finance the 20% but was told by the state it couldn’t use the federal funds on the state-administered project, Town Chairman Kevin Kimmes said. Instead, the town will underfund its general services to pay the $158,900  and use the ARPA funds to cover the gap.

The town received about $170,000 in ARPA funds, Kimmes said. The town used a small portion of the funds for a pandemic-era hazardous pay bonus to town employees.

For years, the 1965 bridge has shown signs of age, Stephan said, noting its guardrails are not up to modern safety standards and its 15-ton load limit signals its obsolescence.

“This bridge got a lower rating during an inspection so a lot of repairs were done that temporarily improved it,” he said.

However, the bridge is now starting to show severe structural issues, including chunks of concrete falling off and rebar becoming exposed, Stephan said.

The town hoped to receive a fully funded instead of partially funded grant, Stephan said. But due to Cedar Sauk Road being considered a “collector road” for the Milwaukee metro area, it was ineligible for the best of the grants.

The DOT-determined $790,500 budget for the project may seem high, Stephan said, but that’s usual for state agencies, which use better-safe-than-sorry estimates.

“That’s normal for a DOT construction. They use estimating standards for future construction costs and sometimes those are higher than what it actually costs,” Stephan said, adding the state would prefer to come over rather than under budget to avoid complications during construction.

The project’s “soft costs,” including engineering, state reviews and other construction services that will cost an estimated $169,000, are included in the budget, Stephan said.

He said the amount of federal and state funding for infrastructure projects, especially for roads and bridges, varies by administration.

During the pandemic, he said, there was a push toward funding projects like these, with programs like the BIL receiving federal approval.

The tentative schedule for project planning is during 2025 and construction during 2026, Kimmes said.