The City of Jefferson will only have minor street and sidewalk projects this summer.

Street Superintendent Dave Teeples says they will be repairing and installing new sidewalk, curb and gutters at various locations around blocks off of the downtown square and along Washington Street and Wilson Avenue.  Crews will then move onto residential areas for similar projects.  Another minor project will be repairing manhole covers to be level with the streets.

One other area Teeples points out will be chip sealing the alleyways and streets on the north end of the City.

The City Council approved a contract with Blacktop Service Company from Humboldt to chip seal the alleys between Harrison and Park, Walnut and High, West and Grimmell and Walnut and Elm.  Some streets will also get a chip seal coat.  The streets include Locust between Central and Perry streets, Perry between Wilson Avenue and Cedar Street, Head Street between Cedar and Locust streets, Olive Street between Central and Head streets and Wilson Avenue between Central and the railroad tracks.

City Administrator Mike Palmer says chip sealing alleyways isn’t a new process, but something they want to continue to do.

“We experimented with this several years ago to see how the seal coat would hold up.  They’ve gone through two winters now and they’ve held up beautifully.  (It) Keeps the dust down, they’re much easier to plow snow on.  So we’re going to continue on that process to one day when we have all the alleys seal coated.”

The contract is for $49,543.64 from the streets budget.

Teeples adds that once he knows how much money the City will get from the increase in the gas tax for the next fiscal year, he will either spend it on fixing more curb and gutter or save it for a major street repair project in the future.