Construction work a ‘horror story’ for South St. residents

Irrigation systems and new sidewalks destroyed, according to neighborhood homeowners

By: Mark Moffa
   
   HIGHTSTOWN – More than a dozen residents of South Street came together Monday to inform the Borough Council of a construction project they say has been a nightmare.
   Since July, South Street has been under construction, with contractors replacing the borough’s water and sewer lines in addition to installing new sidewalks and curbs and a new road surface.
   "I think everybody in here has a horror story," South Street resident Ted Purdell said at the meeting. He said the contractors were "excavators not pipe layers" and that construction workers have done shoddy work.
   Resident Cindy Glancy said one day she came home and a pipe was sticking out of the ground near her driveway.
   "My husband was out there and he said that wasn’t acceptable," Ms. Glancy said.
   She then described how the situation was handled by the contractor, who tried to pound the pipe down with a sledgehammer.
   "Then he took the bucket to the back hoe – pound, pound, pound," Ms. Glancy described. "That didn’t work either."
   The worker finally decided to saw the pipe off, she said.
   "Lo and behold, (the next day) we had water coming in the sleeve to our gas line," she said.
   She said she had to receive water from a connection to her neighbor’s water supply via garden hose until it was fixed, at her expense, for $2,300.
   Ms. Glancy also said she had an irrigation system on her property.
   "They tore the heck out of it," she said.
   "We had no idea that they were going to tear into it like they did," she said.
   "We had no idea they were putting a drainage system in under the sidewalk," Ms. Glancy added. "That wasn’t in our letter from the mayor."
   Many residents, nine in all, voiced their opinion on the South Street construction.
   "My horror story was the tree," said South Street resident Bob Murdock.
   He said he came home one day to find eight to 10 pieces of root from his tree on his property. A neighbor told him what happened to the tree while the workers were tearing out Mr. Murdock’s sidewalk.
   "When they did this, the tree tilted toward the house and then they pulled it out again with the backhoe," Mr. Murdock said.
   He was worried that with a weakened root structure, the tree could fall.
   "When and if that tree falls over, it’s not going to be my doing," he said.
   Mike Stern of South Street said that he and two other residents were recently forced by the borough to replace their sidewalks, to the tune of a couple of thousand dollars.
   "For us it’s really the difference between one of our kids going to preschool or not, and I mean that." Mr. Stern said.
   Now, he added, the contractors have removed and replaced a portion of his new sidewalk after he had asked that the sidewalk be spared.
   "I feel that we should have our sidewalks replaced so that they match and so that they’re done properly," said Doug Radtke, one of the other residents who recently had to replace his sidewalk at his own cost.
   Some residents griped that the contractor was trying to "strong-arm" residents into getting their own water lines replaced at a cost of $2,000 per house.
   Other complaints varied from workers damaging the late Josephine Dawes’ fence at 238 S. Main St. to the improper loading of large trash bins and huge pieces of construction debris being included in backfill material.
   Borough Engineer Carmela Santaniello was present and took notes and responded to the residents’ comments.
   "I am generally very aware of what goes on on South Street," Ms. Santaniello said. "We have an inspector on site and he’s probably there 80 percent of the time."
   In response to the residents who complained of the contractor strong-arming them, she said to just say no.
   "All you have to do is say no to the man," she said. "This contractor is (only) obligated to the borough to replace the main and the pipe from the main to the curb."
   To resident David Keeler, who said he now had a water leak on his property that didn’t exist before, she said the contractor may be responsible.
   "Yours might be a situation where he wasn’t gentle enough," Ms. Santaniello said, explaining that workers must be careful in connecting new pipes from the street to the old pipes leading to many homes.
   "If I have to fight with the contractor, that’s part of what I have to do," she added.
   As far as the folks with the sidewalks, she made a recommendation to the council.
   "I’d like to recommend to council that we do replace those sidewalks," she said. "Where we broke the sidewalk we absolutely would be replacing it at the borough’s expense."
   About Ms. Glancy’s irrigation system, Ms. Santaniello apologized and said the borough will pay for repairs to her system.
   "We didn’t expect to find an irrigation system – no one thought to ask," she said.
   Ms. Santaniello said she will look into the other questions raised, many of which she had not heard until the council meeting.
   "This project on South Street is the most encompassing project that we’ve ever done in 10 years in the borough," Ms. Santaniello said to everyone. "No wonder you’re unhappy."
   Most of the residents in attendance joined in applauding Ms. Santaniello after she completed her responses – an act that brought a smile to her face for the first time that evening.
   Some residents, though, still think the borough’s notice of the construction should have been more detailed in describing the large scope of the work.
   Mr. Purdell fears the project, which was slated for completion by mid-October, may not be done by the time cold weather sets in.
   Ms. Santaniello said she hopes to have everything completed soon.
   She also recommended that the council approve the borough’s third payment to the construction company, GSG Construction of Trenton, saying that this payment did not include any of the work done in the last two weeks.
   The council did approve a payment of $27,395.90, bringing GSG’s total payment to $103,667.24. The company bid $300,532.70 on the project.