Letter to the Editor: Is Bonney Lake Wasting Personnel Resources?

Dear Editor,

I have worked in all phases of heavy highway construction for going on 23 years and am a Supt. with a major contractor in the region. If what I saw was the normal production of the City of Bonney Lake, some things need to change.   

Ok, on May 30, May 31 and the morning of June 1... Did I really see the City of Bonney Lake with a crew of four people, two trucks and one tractor spend two to two-and-a-half days (shifts) mowing the lawn along SR 410 between 214th and 233rd?

Using some basic construction math, here is a real world breakdown of rough costs:

Figure a minimum of $40 per hour, per person (wage plus benefits). So, four people is $160 an hour times an 8-hour shift equals $640 times two days, equals $1280. (I'm being nice, I saw them out there three different days). So, the math works out to $1,280, just for labor costs.

Equipment costs: lets go on the low end, assuming the city has bought and paid for all this gear. It is still no less than $80 per hour (this is a cheap generic charge out rate to cover; fuel, maintenance, deprecation, insurance etc.. usually way more but being nice here). So again, 8 hours times $80 equals $640 times 2 days equals $1280.

Labor at $1280 plus gear at $1280 equals $2560, a rough cost to mow something that you could hire a landscaping service to do for ??? WAY LESS!

Other points:

They left grass in the gutters along with weeds growing up i.e. poor job. The grass they left will work its way into the drainage system and start to clog it, eventually leading to more maintenance along that stretch of roadway. Sadly, all four times I drove by there were two people just sitting in one of the trucks apparently talking and watching the tractor work.  

Good money says they will tell you they had to set up traffic control, to follow behind the tractor blah blah blah, when the truth is, if they got their gear out of the road, they would need nothing more than vests and a 'shoulder work ahead' sign… Self imposed costs! A landscaping crew of two or three people with mowers and weed eaters could do this same stretch in a day, parking in one of the many wide spots along that stretch of road doing this job safer and cheaper!

Hell, I’ll do it for $1000 and bring my own 'shoulder closed' sign and vest.

Thank you,

Phil Lyonais