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Council examines sidewalk repair and utility-locate contracts, asks about in‑house capacity
Summary
Councilmembers questioned the scope, prioritization and costs of a sidewalk repairs contract (SW-97) and a utility-locate services contract; staff said locators perform on-site locating and that sidewalk bids covered about 12,000 linear feet with bid ranges roughly $1.9M–$2.25M, and noted an $80M backlog of sidewalk needs.
Durham councilmembers on Thursday pulled and questioned two public-works contracts: utility-locate services and a sidewalk-repair contract (SW-97), seeking detail about contractor tasks, prioritization and whether the city could perform more work in house.
Public Works Assistant Director Tasha Johnson described the locate-services contract as covering simpler locate requests that the city assigns to contractors while staff focus on complex or continuous locates for capital projects. Johnson said locators do on‑site work — finding manholes or cleanouts and marking likely utility alignments — and…
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