Clay County Times-Democrat: Local News: Local projects underway (05/07/09)

Workers with Delta Asphalt are shown beginning to resurface the runway of the Piggott airport Tuesday morning. The crew also will be paving the parking lot between the football field and baseball complex in the coming days.
(Times photo/Tim Blair)

[Click to enlarge]

Work crews will be busy across the city of Piggott during May, as a number of clean-up and improvement projects have begun.

Weather permitting, crews will be working to clean out Sugar Creek throughout the city in a project that is being funded by the Natural Resources Conservation Service. Meanwhile, paving crews have begun to resurface the runway at the Piggott airport and will soon turn their attention to the parking lot between Independence Park and Parker Field.

The Piggott School District has also let the bid for paving the parking lot in front of the new PHS gym, but that is expected to be done later in the spring.

The creek clean-up project was an offshoot of this year's ice storm, which left much of the channel choked with limbs and debris. This prompted the NRCS, the federal agency in charge of floodplain control and watershed protection, to step in and fund the effort. The job was bid to J&K Construction and is scheduled to be completed in 30 days.

According to Piggott Mayor Gerald Morris, the crews were scheduled to begin work Monday, but it was unknown how much the heavy rains of the weekend would hamper that effort.

Morris also reports work will continue as weather permits on the airport paving project and the parking lot at the football and baseball fields. The parking lot effort is being done jointly with the Piggott School District and a portion of the funding will be in the form of a grant through the city recreation department.

The project to re-pave the airport is being paid for by a 90/10 matching grant of just over $250,000 from the Arkansas Aeronautics Commission.

In March the commission distributed over $3.5 million in 41 separate grants for airports across the state, including Piggott, Rector and Corning. In awarding the grants, the commissioners also applauded State Representative Mike Patterson of Piggott for his work in securing supplemental appropriations from the Arkansas legislature to make the effort possible.

Work on both paving projects should progress quickly if the weather cooperates.