An upcoming project by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation on West Washington Street is going to create major work for the Bradford Sanitary Authority.

At Tuesday’s meeting, authority members discussed the PennDOT corridor upgrade on West Washington Street between Mechanic Street and the city line.

“The project involves road base replacement as deep as 60 inches with the final roadway grade being an overall average of 4.5 inches lower than the current elevation with some areas seeing between a 6- to 9-inch drop in final roadway surface grade,” Executive Director Steve Disney explained.

“Lowering the roadway severely impacts the authority’s buried assets such as sanitary sewer mains and associated manholes,” he continued. Assets can be raised with little trouble, but lowering them is another story.

“Authority assets such as manholes can be adapted and adjusted to increases in roadway surfaces and are engineered and manufactured to add riser rings, at minimal cost. But lowering roadway elevation is very detrimental to buried utility infrastructure and extremely costly,” Disney said.

The Sanitary Authority will use Bankson Engineers, in conjunction with the Bradford City Water Authority, to “provide the surveying and engineering for this PennDOT project, which will entail major subsurface replacement/relocation of authority assets,” Disney said. “A relocation agreement will need to be established with PennDOT.”

After the meeting, Disney said there’s no solid start date yet on the project. “I know at one time they wanted to put it out for bid later this year, but I cannot see that happening given the huge scope of the project and the amount of utility work that needs to be planned out,” he said. “I would anticipate this getting pushed to 2026.”

Also at the meeting, the board members discussed the meter replacement project that is being carried out in conjunction with the water authority. “Upon recommendation from the authorities’ auditors, a formal agreement was established between the Water & Sanitary Authorities to jointly fund this re-metering project,” Disney explained. “The PENNVEST loan finalization close-out meeting is scheduled for June 18.”

The director gave an update on some physical damage to the grounds caused by a motorist.

“A motor vehicle inadvertently drove down through a portion of the grass/lawn areas above the reed beds, getting stuck and creating a considerable amount of tire ruts in the soft ground areas,” Disney explained to The Era. “The lawn areas affected from this incident have been restored.”

He continued, saying that overall, sewer and stormwater delinquency rates remained steady during April. Matthew M. Johnston’s property located at 21 Bagley Ave. did not receive any bids during the sheriff sale May 7. Johnston owes current balances of $8,569.21 on water, $9,250.19 on sewer and $1,815.95 on stormwater for a total balance of $19,635.35.

The authority also filed a lien and issued a demand letter against a property located at 11 Edwards St. owned by Ken Marsh; he has until June 17 to respond before proceeding. Marsh currently owes $1,610.98 on water, $2,068.14 on sewer and $919.95 on stormwater for a total of $4,599.07.

Municipal liens will also be filed against the Oyo Hotel at 153 Main St., the owners of which owe current balances of $4,203.76 for water, $5,729.86 for sewer, $477.51 for stormwater for a total of $10,411.13, and a lien against a Rasheed Deeb property located at 23 Glenwood Ave. with balances of $2,984.08 for water, $4,588.85 for sewer, $85.44 for storm water for a total of $7,658.37.

At the treatment plant, Jeff Devine from Ashbrook has responded to issues with the sequencing batch reactor, especially during winter months. The company suggests additional heat trace, insulation or other winterizing methods, and possible alternatives for threaded stems to better handle the Bradford winter environment.

The authority has been in contact with Gannett Fleming regarding some defective areas of roofing discovered at the main wastewater treatment plant. This appears to be covered under warranty but the authority needs to confirm, Disney said.

Field crews are currently operating in sanitary subsystem 10, conducting full assessments of buried infrastructure assets. This subsystem encompasses a large area from the Boylston/Forman streets area through South Avenue and West Corydon Street.

The authority was made aware of a logging project within the city limits through a PA-811 call that is to be conducted; the area to be logged is above Petrolia Street. The logging company’s stormwater management plan was provided to Gannett Fleming for their review, along with topographic and soil maps. The authority is awaiting a current status update for site specific details that would protect the area from stormwater runoff.

BSA crews worked with Cummins Construction to extend a 10-inch stormwater main on Congress Street that connects the new ATA Terminal stormwater detention equipment with a storm main that connects with infrastructure toward Main Street.

The authority will host the McKean County Conservation District Rain Barrel class at the Wastewater Treatment Plant from 10 a.m. to noon Friday. Participants will learn how to make their own rain barrels and will take them home for use at their properties.

A bid for a property at 159 E. Main St., which is in the McKean County repository, was submitted by the authority to the courthouse on Feb. 28. The authority would like to use this property to access the sanitary main and several manholes running behind this row of houses. City Council and Bradford Area School District approved the sale. McKean County will also need to review and take action on the submission.

The authority held its May safety meeting last week with a focus on summer work activities and how to avoid heat-related issues such as heat stroke and heat exhaustion.

Employees Jacob Johnson and Justin Grice are scheduled for Certified DEP exams to be conducted June 25 related to the Lab Supervisor Exam and Operator A General Exam.