We all know gas prices and inflation are raising the cost of everything. It really hits the Circle XX road effort hard.  The main costs to maintain the Circle XX roads are labor and asphalt.  Labor cost are rising and it's difficult to find workers up here anyway.  Asphalt is a petroleum byproduct that's price goes up with gas prices. 85% of our roads are paved which require asphalt products for repairs. 

In addition to the wear and tear created by water damage, gopher holes, and heavy trucks, most of the Circle XX paved road are over 20 years old and are requiring more repairs.  As asphalt ages the binding agent breaks down and cracks open. The breakup accelerates when water seeps through the cracks and softens the ground underneath. The 1" asphalt overlays we have been able to put on Riata, Jaquima and Tapadero over the last 9 years have helped those sections of road but the rest of the paved roads need attention. The unpaved roads also have weather damage that requires periodic scraping, hole filling and re-rocking. On an annual basis we need to fix culverts, clear blocked road side ditches and spray along the roads to lower the fire hazard.

Between 2013 and 2019 the cold patch we use to fill pot holes ran between $91 a ton to $93 a ton. In 2020 we had to pay almost $97 a ton. This year the cost changes daily with the price of oil.

The cost for trucks to deliver the cold patch has been going up. From 2014 to 2018 truckers charged us about $100 to deliver a load of cold patch, In 2019 the price jumped to $175 and to $240 for delivery in 2021.  We just had to pay $350 for a load in 2022. Trucking cost also impact contractor's bids to do our road work.

In 1993 $93,000 paid to pave 6 miles of road with 2" chip and seal. This calculates to be about 26 cents per square foot. In 2005 the cost for 2" asphalt road work was a $1.00 per square foot. In 2011 we paid $1.80 a square foot for 2" asphalt. By 2014 the cost for 2" asphalt was $2.25 to $2.50 a square foot, so we switched to laying "1 asphalt at $1.15 a square foot. Between 2015 to 2018 1" asphalt remained around $1.30 a square foot. In 2020 1" asphalt jumped to $1.75 a square foot. In 2021 we used 1" asphalt at $1.94 a square foot on a section of Tapadero and tried 1" chip & seal on a section of Romel at $1.05 a square foot.  One contractor was charging $4.50 a square foot for 2" asphalt. To keep costs down we currently plan to use more chip & seal in the future.

With the rising costs, if we continue with our current $400 a year Property Assessment Fee, we will have to do less road work each year to stay within our budget.