The price is still maybe 40 percent higher than the original estimate but it’s also 14 percent lower than the original bid.

Last week, at the Chesterton Stormwater Management Board’s meeting, Town Engineer Mark O’Dell reported that, by tweaking the specs for the Val’s lift station project, he and contractor Woodruff & Sons have managed to reduce the low-bid contract price of $205,888 to around $178,000.

Among the modifications, O’Dell said: only one pump will actually be installed in the lift station, while a backup pump will be available for use but kept in the shop; sand bedding will be used instead of stone; and something like $4,000 in components have been eliminated from the specs.

Even so, $178,000 is a lot more than the $125,000 to $140,000 estimate of the project’s cost.

The idea behind the lift station is to pump stormwater from the alley behind Val’s Famous Pizza & Grinders, located at Broadway and 11th Street. In heavy rains that alley—the lowest point in the Town of Chesterton—tends to flood. The lift station will pump the runoff from the alley to a large stormwater sewer line on Lincoln Ave., about 1,100 feet to the south.

Woodruff & Sons will break ground on the project in the second or third week of January, O’Dell told the board, and begin immediately installing the pipe. But the contractor probably won’t take delivery of the lift-station components themselves for six to eight weeks. Best bet: the job wll take three to four months.

The project is being funded with the proceeds of the $880,000 stormwater bond issued late last year. Projects already completed as part of the bond issue: the cleaning of the Lincoln Ave. detention basin, located off 23rd Street by the Prairie Duneland Trail; and two repairs of stormwater lines along 23rd Street, one of them an emergency job.

In other business, members voted 3-0 to write off eight uncollectable accounts totaling $50.08.

Meanwhile, MS4 Operator Jennifer Gadzala reported that, on Nov. 28-29, she presented a program to 240 environmental science students at Chesterton High School on wastewater and stormwater quality.

MS4 Operator Jennifer Gadzala took a moment at the meeting to thank staff for their great work over the last year. “Thanks to all department heads who have worked with me in my MS4 capacity,” she said, “being my eyes and years in the field and keeping on top of good housekeeping.”

In November the Stormwater Utility ran a surplus of $21,849 and in the year-to-date is running a surplus of $48,439.

Posted 12/26/2012