Hamden OKs $2.8M Engineering Capital Budget

Safer bridges, freshly paved sidewalks, and more expansive trails are on deck for Hamden, according to a newly approved $2.875 million capital budget for the town’s Engineering Department.

On Monday night, Hamden’s Legislative Council approved the budgetary requests of Town Engineer Mark Austin during Zoom meeting. Local legislators took that vote after deferring that decision for over a month, or four years, depending on how one interprets the timeline.

On Aug. 17, the council approved half of a capital improvement plan presented to them by Hamden’s administration. It was the first time in years that they had voted to pass even parts of a capital budget. Finance Director Scott Jackson told the Independent that Hamden was ineligible to bond money for capital projects while the town maintained a negative fund balance.

Read more on the ongoing evolution of the 2021 – 2022 capital plan here.

In total, the engineering budget approved Monday night includes $1.22 million for bridge and roadway engineering design services; $770,000 for grant matching engineering construction; $700,000 for sidewalk repairs; $123,000 for GIS upgrades; $100,000 for drainage improvements; and $70,000 for addressing infrastructural woes within public buildings.

The biggest price tag is attached to consulting and design services. That will pay design experts to help restructure four bridges and traffic consultants to determine how to make five roads into ​“Complete Streets.” Traffic consultants and readers will also assist Hamden in moving forward with the Community Connectivity sidewalk project.

An additional $770,000 is needed to match grant proposals for construction on the various projects listed above. Austin told the Independent that he has earmarked at least $20 million in grant funding. Financial commitment from the town is required for many of those grant applications to move forward.

Likewise, Austin said that while at least $1 million should go towards maintaining and repairing Hamden’s sidewalks each year, LoCIP (Local Capital Improvement Program) funds from the state will cover $300,000, or a little less than one third, of the coming year’s sidewalk expenditures.

Austin also asked for $198,000 to replace vintage survey and geographic information system technologies— but ended up with $123,000. That happened after council persons questioned the need for a new, $75,000 pipe crawler— a camera on wheels which can be inserted into pipes to inspect for breaks or root intrusion and aid in proactive maintenance of systems like plumbing and water distribution.

Austin said that private companies charge up to $300,000 a day to rent out similar technologies. At the request of Councilwoman Dominique Baez, he said he would look into regionalizing or renting out pipe crawlers from neighboring municipalities.

As of Tuesday morning, he said he had identified two towns— Monroe and Bloomfield— who may own pipe crawlers. He will return to the Council with more information on that one line item on Oct. 18, in hopes of saving what Baez called ​“a pretty penny.”

Lastly, the council allotted $70,000 Monday night to repair the Town Hall parking garage. Austin noted that the price for resealing the deck and construction joints of the building have increased by around $15,000 since he last applied for funding from the town.

During the council’s August meeting, $100,000 of Austin’s original budget was OK’d for pressing drainage concerns facing residents. Austin said that about eight million of that sum will go towards improving drainage concentrated in Hamden’s Newhall area and on Mix Avenue, where residents experience regular flooding.

Like many of the other projects identified by the Engineering Department, the town has postponed fixing those drainage systems for about 10 years, according to Austin. Within that time frame, he said, the cost of fixing the flooding has gone up by about $3 million. That’s due to both updated rainfall models that recognize the real severity of climate change as well as damages to properties carried over from nearly a decade of neglect.

That example indicates the pros and cons of deferring basic engineering projects across town, according to Austin. ​“When it comes to a purely academic look, we have better information now,” Austin noted. Because previous engineering decisions through to the mid 2000s have been based on outdated climate models put together in the 1970s, Hamden may have saved itself some cash by putting off certain projects.

“But these residents have been living with these conditions, living with the flooding, for years,” Austin said. ​“Those are our customers.”

Local legislation states that departments cannot use money set aside by capital budgeting for at least 21 days. After that point, the town is committed to bonding money as Austin moves forward in hiring consultants, drafting designs, and conducting studies in order to receive grants that will support or reimburse the majority of the capital engineering projects highlighted by Austin.

Councilperson Justin Farmer pointed out that the majority of the projects described in Austin’s budget are contingent on grant money. ​“If the matching doesn’t come to fruition, how do we intend to finish these projects?” he asked.

Austin clarified that each project will be completed as grant money comes in and that the town is only responsible for providing the monetary amounts asked for in the now approved capital plan.

In addition to identifying millions in grant money, Austin has saved the town thousands of additional dollars by establishing partnerships with students and professors in senior design programs at local universities.

For example, he said students from the University of Connecticut have evaluated the roof of the Keefe Center while three different teams from the University of New Haven and Quinnipiac University have examined Fire Station No. 2 and evaluated the outstanding drainage problems in Hamden’s Newhall neighborhood.

In exchange for real world experience, Austin said, Hamden betters its relationship with nearby academic institutions and receives expert insight at no cost.