Lake County supervisors direct staff to prepare change order to add asphalt to Cobb-area roads

Interim Public Works Director Lars Ewing told the Lake County Board of Supervisors that he paused parts of the Cobb Area Road Rehabilitation Project after residents raised concerns about using double chip seal on several steep, low-speed roads.

Ewing said construction began this summer after the board approved plans in July 2024 and the county awarded the contract to Argonaut Constructors in April 2025. "I paused the contract after the first layer of chips was were placed so that we could reevaluate," Ewing said, citing conversations with road maintenance staff and the project’s design engineer.

The board heard technical explanations from Nichols Consulting Engineers (NCE), public-safety concerns from Cal Fire, and pleas from Cobb residents who said the initial chip-seal lift is already showing raveling and potholes. "We would typically expect to get 10, 15 years out of a double chip in a low traffic environment," James, a senior pavement engineer with NCE, told the board, adding that performance can fall well short of that in snowy, steep or heavily used local roads. Paul Duncan, operations chief for Cal Fire (South Lake County), warned that "putting a chip seal down to me is not a long term solution. And it is a hazard for that community," saying heavy apparatus and snowplows require a strong underlying base.

Ewing recommended modifying the contract with Argonaut Constructors to place hot-mix asphalt on roads that had been pulverized and received only a first chip-seal lift. He said placing asphalt would increase service life and reduce future maintenance interventions. Ewing told the board the estimated additional cost to pave the roughly five miles that have one lift of chip in place was about $1,400,000; after anticipated contract savings of roughly $700,000 the net increase would be about $700,000. The agenda packet referenced a different estimate (about $1,100,000) and included a $225,000 discretionary offer from Supervisor Pyska.

Board members and residents debated trade-offs: several supervisors and public commenters emphasized the long-term value of asphalt in steep, snowy areas heavily used by garbage trucks, school buses and emergency vehicles. Multiple residents urged approval of asphalt to avoid frequent repairs. Supervisor Pyska said she was prepared to contribute discretionary funds and later told the board she was "pushing in most of my discretionary funding to make this happen because it's that important."

County staff said funding for the net increase is available within the road fund appropriation for the current budget year and that using those funds would not require pulling money from an unrelated account; staff also said the county has unanticipated-occurrence funding in services and supplies that could help. Staff cautioned that any money spent on this project would reduce funds available for other road work elsewhere in the county.

The board did not vote on an ordinance or a contract amendment at the meeting. Instead, supervisors directed staff to negotiate a change order with Argonaut (the contractor has indicated it would honor contract unit prices) and return to the board in the coming weeks with the formal change-order item for consideration. County staff and the construction manager will calculate the net credit from eliminating the second chip-seal lift and finalize exact change-order costs before the board acts.

Background: the project was designed by Nichols Consulting Engineers and was funded through SB 1 (referenced in the project memo). The overall 2024 Pavement Rehabilitation Project covers about 16 miles of roads in the Cobb area; roughly five miles were identified at the hearing as roads that had been pulverized and received a single chip-seal lift when the contract was paused. County maintenance staff previously performed chip seals in other districts and the county is planning additional chip-seal work in multiple districts in the coming years.

Board direction: staff will return with a formal change-order recommendation, including final cost figures and a funding plan, for board consideration; no formal vote on the change order was taken at this meeting.