County planning six road projects

WINSTON COUNTY - The fiscal year 2027 Winston County Transportation plan, approved by the county commission at their August 10, meeting, includes six road resurfacing projects spanning over nine miles, at a cost of $885,000, according to Road Engineer James Glasgow.
After Glasgow provided all three commissioners copies of the transportation plan and they had looked over it, Winston County Commission Chairman David Cummings asked for a motion to approve it, with District 2 Commissioner Roger Hayes making a motion, seconded by District 1 Commissioner Rutger Hyche and all voting in favor.
Glasgow explained the county is required to provide a breakdown on how funding is going to be expended on roadway projects for the next fiscal year.
“It is what we anticipate to receive and expend from October 1 2026, to September 30, 2027,” Glasgow stated.
The $885,000 county officials expect to spend on the road projects is a combination of two sources of funding - Rebuild Alabama funds generated from gas tax proceeds and Federal Aid Exchange funds, Glasgow explained.
“They all come in from the gas tax,” Glasgow clarified. 
The county expects to receive a total of  $973,500 in Rebuild Alabama funds which is divided  at54 percent for district 1, and 46 percent for district 2, with this calculation based on the amount of roads in each district, Glasgow explained.
Each year, Winston County receives $400,000 in Federal Aid Exchange funds, he added.
“It has to be used on major, minor collector (roads) or bridges on your National Bridge Inventory,” Glasgow explained. “Any bridge in the county, if it’s over 20 feet, is considered.”
Major collector roads are usually those with a higher traffic count than minor collector roads, Glasgow continued.
Although the total in outside funding the county expects to receive is around $1.3 million, that does not mean the county will receive that funding in one lump sum on October 1, Glasgow explained.
“It comes in monthly,” he said. “We will be building that up, so we have to plan our projects.”
Currently, the county had to wait on road restoration work on County Road 59, which was on the fiscal year 2026 plan, until the funding could be built up, Glasgow explained.
“This is what we anticipate receiving by September 30 of next year (2027),” he stated. 
Four road projects in the FY 2027 transportation plan are in district 1, with the remaining two projects in district 2, according to Glasgow.
“District 1 has more smaller projects,” he added, in a summary of each district’s projects.
County Road 77, also known as Helicon Road, will be resurfaced from Arley five miles to the Helicon community using Federal Aid funds,  requiring a county match of $373,407.62, according to the transportation plan chart Glasgow submitted to commissioners for review. 
Total estimated project cost is $1.8 million, the chart showed.
The next road resurfacing project listed is Littleville Road, also known as Ray Farm Road, about 2.39 miles from County Road 30 to County Road 11,  with an estimated cost of $340,452.17, the chart showed.
About .42 of a mile of County Road 479, a loop road off Macedonia Road in the Needmore area, will be resurfaced under the transportation plan, with a cost of $17,847.50, according to the plan.
 A half-mile stretch of County Road 55, from Highway 278 to Henryfield Church Road, will be applied with a hot-mix treatment, at a cost of $54,000, the plan indicated.
“It will be repairing some really bad areas, but it won’t be the whole road,” Glasgow stated.
A little over a half mile of County Road 235 will be resurfaced in the Wilson Bend Area from County Road 12, near Arley, at a cost of $66,325
The last road project listed on the plan is  County Road 3725, from Sardis Airport Road in the Addison area to the county line, with the project costing $33,650, officials said.
“This year is a little different because we are fortunate to have multiple different grant sources coming in,” Glasgow informed.
Sources for these funds are not just Rebuild Alabama and the Federal Aid Exchange program, but also funding secured by U.S. Senator Katie Britt and U.S. Congressman Robert Aderholt, Glasgow explained.
Britt’s office secured $900,000 for a project to restore a section of washed out road in the Pepper’s Mill area between Airport Road and Dime Road in Haleyville, but that project has not been listed on next year’s transportation plan, Glasgow indicated.
Aderholt’s office secured $1.5 million for resurfacing County Roads 61 and 57, which is also not listed on this year’s plan, Glasgow stated.

State legislators comment 

State Senate Pro-Tem Garlan Gudger and State Representative Tim Wadsworth have also assisted with funding for the County Road 77 project, Glasgow added.
“The county officials, state officials and federal officials are continuing to request funding and the efforts are paying off,” Wadsworth stated.
Gudger added, “The high cost of a road like (County Road 77) is just more than local funding can do, so it's good that the legislative delegation and Winston County officials can all work together to get extra funding from Montgomery for this project.”
 “Although we’re going to have to pay some, (these funding sources) will make our dollars go a whole lot further,” Glasgow said
“We’re in a really good situation compared to what we could have been, if we hadn’t received these funds,” he said.
“We’ve been able to do a whole lot since 2019, that we would have never gotten done.  Our work order list would be a whole lot higher had we not had the Rebuild (Alabama) funding,” Glasgow continued.
“We don’t have quite as much on the plan this year because we have a lot of unknowns. There is no free money out there,” Glasgow said.
“We’re fortunate to get these grants, but we’re going to have to match them, so we’re kind of holding some back to be able to match projects,” he added.
“There is a chance we can add some projects to this (plan), once we get a better idea of what we’re going to be required,” he continued.

Cummings explains project delays, method of filing concerns

Cummings explained he works with both district commissioners to secure funding on large projects.
“I know from being a previous commissioner that the wet weather this year has created a lot of challenges for both districts,” Cummings stated.
“You can’t get the projects done on time because they can’t do specific work because it’s been too wet,” Cummings added.
“We’re a little behind on some stuff, but they are doing good to try and get it caught up,” Cummings further explained.
Cummings wanted the public to know that a lot of planning goes behind road projects and the commission is always seeking outside funding sources to help repair or restore the roads.
“We  still have a lot of grants out there, trying to secure funding for extra roads that’s not on the Rebuild (Alabama funding),” Cummings explained.
“We don’t sit around doing Rebuild projects,” he emphasized. “We go after funds for other projects. We have several right now that have been awarded and we’ve got several we expect to get awarded.”
Cummings also explained there are procedures that need to be followed by those who may be experiencing problems with a county road.
“If you have a problem with a county road in Winston County, make sure you call the road department and turn in a work order,” Cummings emphasized.
“That’s how the process works,” he said. “If you turn in a work order, then the work order gets turned over to the district, then they handle the problems.
“Just commenting to people, ‘my road is bad. I need it fixed. My road is this, my road is that,’ is not the proper way to turn in a problem with a road in Winston County,” Cummings further emphasized.
“You call the road department and turn in a work order. That’s the proper way to get your road fixed,” he pointed out.
Residents can call the Winston County Road Department at (205) 489-5031 to place a work order, he said.