Bids for Long-Awaited Endicott Clay Road
Project Under Review

By Gordon HopkinsHighway Superintendent Tim Farmer opened bids for the long-awaited Endicott Clay Road Project on Tuesday, July 12, 2022, at a meeting of the Jefferson County Board of Commissioners.The Endicott Clay Road project, which has been in the works since 2017, is intended to improve road service from the Endicott Clay Products brickyard to Highway 15. The road receives a lot of wear and tear due to trucks coming to and going from the brickyard. The county has decided it is more cost-efficient to construct a new, hard-surface road west of Endicott Clay, rather than repairing the existing road that runs east from Endicott Clay Products. Jefferson County Commissioners and the Highway Department considered repairing the existing road that runs east. However, the road is in a flood plain. In order to meet guidelines which would be required to obtain any federal or state funding, the road would have to be raised, along with all the bridges on the road. County Commissioners have determined that this would likely be cost prohibitive. In the end, it was decided to create a new road to the west.Commissioner Mark Schoenrock talked about funding for the project.“Five, six years ago, we talked about how we could get a new road out to our top employer here in the county, Endicott Clay Products. And thus began a very long and dedicated effort to try to find the funding. Because that's always a challenge for a project like this, is how are you going to pay for it? And so, Jefferson County has been successful in receiving a Department of Commerce grant, and also a Nebraska Department of Transportation grant to make this a reality. The funding will pay for approximately 90 percent of this project. Endicott Clay and Jefferson County are going to be sharing the remaining 10 percent of the cost.”Ryan Parker, President & CEO of Endicott Clay Products, as well as representatives of the various companies that submitted bids were present at the meeting.Schoenrock said, “Whenever you have to put out a bid, one of our worries is, you put in a bid out there and nobody responds. So, we can see we don't have that problem here this morning.”Six bids were received:A & R Construction Company from Plainview: $4,102,197.39Vogts Parga Construction LLC from Newton, Kansas: $4,974,876.91Constructors Incorporated from Lincoln: $4,178,437.46Werner Construction Inc. from Hastings: $3,831,834.78Koss Construction Company from Topeka, Kansas: $4,430,768.63Bauer Infrastructure LLC from Martel: $5,144,703.47The job does not automatically go to the lowest bidder, as there are other factors to be considered, including estimated start and completion dates.Farmer explained, “We will need to evaluate these bids and get back to you with recommendations. We will also have to get approval to award from the EDA (Economic Development Administration). So that's the next step of the process. I have estimated will take about three weeks to turn that around.”

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