By BARBARA GREEN
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Bowie City Councilors accepted the low bidder to replace water lines in the area of Wichita and Hutchinson streets, approved the purchase of lighting for a pickleball court and a request for money out of the infrastructure fund to lay a waterline in Al Jo area.
Before getting into the agenda Mayor Gaylynn Burris presented Stony Lowrance, public works director, with an award from the Texas Asphalt Pavement Association for outstanding achievement in quality construction of asphalt pavement for the Bowie Municipal Airport when it received new runaways in 2022.
New business
As with many state grant projects the application process is a long way from the bid acceptance, and in this instance the price skyrocketed.
Michael Tibbetts, Hayter Engineering, explained the original application was made two years ago. The grant was not funded, but then some more money became available and it was funded. Bids were opened in February.
“We were concerned the bids might come in over budget. We therefore designed the project with seven stand-alone street segments to allow us to select a combination of segments that would come closest to our budget ($301,268), while still meeting Texas Department of Agriculture requirements for benefitting at least 51% low to moderate income residences,” explained Tibbetts.
Seven bids were received and their range was wide from $819,345.50 to $2,005,03.

Read the full story in the weekend Bowie News.