The City of Perry recently accepted a bid for an asphalt overlay on 16th Street, as well as crack sealing in Wiese Park, though they likely won’t proceed with a parking lot repair project.

City Administrator Sven Peterson says the section of 16th Street between Lucinda and Taft streets remains closed to through traffic following a severe frost heave earlier this year. However, relief will come soon after the City Council approved the $38,000 bid from Des Moines Asphalt. The same can’t be said for the parking lot of the Public Safety Building, as Peterson says the initial bids were too high. “So it turned out that the 16th Street project came in at a pretty good price. I mean, it’s higher than we expected, but still reasonable. And the parking lot project came in much higher than we expected, so we’re going to kind of put that one on hold for just a minute. We’ll get 16th Street done, that does have a completion date of the end of June. So I know it’s going to be a few more weeks, but hopefully the company can get in here quickly and get that done.”

The bid for the 16th Street overlay and Wiese Park crack sealing was about $8,000 over the initial estimate, but Peterson says the Council found that close enough to accept given the immediate need to get the project finished. As for the parking lot, the low bid was $73,000, also from Des Moines Asphalt, which was nearly $26,000 over the engineer’s estimate. City Engineer Matt Ferrier with Bolton and Menk has been in conversation with the contractor, hoping to get them to reduce their price tag. He will give his recommendation to the City Council at their next meeting on June 3rd, and Peterson says the likely scenario is the Council will reject all bids and try again next year.