Asphalt putting holes in repair budgets, towns say

Drivers may cringe when they pull up to the pumps this summer to fill up their cars, but highway officials are sharing the pain.

Towns across the state are likely to spend a lot more in the coming year to pave and repair public roads as the price of asphalt, which like gasoline is made from crude oil, continues to climb.

``It isn't a pretty picture," said Harold Brown, Bolton's public works director. A decade ago, Brown paid about $20 for a ton of asphalt concrete, or ``hot top," as it's known in the business.

Today, Brown pays $50.24 a ton. Because his budget is limited, Brown has to focus on repairing the busiest roads. The road in front of the average resident's house will be repaved only once every nine years.

Road repair costs are climbing at the same time that cities and towns across the state are already crying out for increased state aid, saying they need help to pay for soaring energy and health care costs.

Public works officials around the western suburbs say recent asphalt prices, which are expected to be close to $60 per ton in paving contracts closed this year, are the highest they have ever seen. And prices don't look like they will stabilize any time soon.

Pricy asphalt is prompting some towns, like Franklin, to rush to resurface and repair as many roads as it can before its current contract expires.

``We're always trying to save the taxpayer a dollar. That's why we've always been really aggressive in paving before July 1," when new contracts kick in, said Brutus Cantoreggi , the town's public works director.

Under the contract that is about to expire, Franklin gets asphalt installed at $49.50 a ton, but Cantoreggi is anticipating that the next contract the town signs will lock in a price up to 20 percent higher, $55 to $60 a ton.

The bottom line: People in Franklin can expect fewer road repairs in the coming year, Cantoreggi said.

Residents might not notice right away if towns across Massachusetts go without resurfacing roads for a few years, Brown said, but they will start feeling it eventually. Rough roads mean higher fuel costs, damage to cars, and are even a detriment to business, he said.

Brown doesn't have much hope for an easy solution rising to the surface soon. ``We need money and I don't know where it's going to come from," Brown said. ``Our taxes are high enough. . . . It's a very tough situation."

A few towns, such as Wellesley, have been sheltered from spiraling prices by multi year contracts that locked in lower prices for the near future.

Wellesley is paying $44.59 this year for each ton of pavement installed. Next year, it will pay $46.82, a price that public works director Michael Pakstis described as reasonable.

Newton, which does all of its own paving rather than relying on a contractor , is paying lower prices as well, but its costs are still rising.

The city has avoided having to slow road construction by patching together money from elsewhere, said city spokesman Jeremy Solomon .

Steve Bevilacqua , whose asphalt and paving company supplies Medway, Wellesley, Holliston, and Bellingham, said he isn't happy about the spike in work in towns that are trying to cram in paving work at lower rates before their contracts expire.

Last week, for example, his crews were working in Westwood, which is on the last year of a three-year contract. ``So they're saving a fortune," he said.

High prices take the biggest toll on businesses like his, he contends, because they are forced to buy at increasingly high prices while honoring prices that are locked in with town governments.

``We have to suck it up and lose money," Bevilacqua said.

David D'Amico , public services director in Medway, said more and more towns are likely to try for multi year contracts. But they could be difficult to arrange, as contractors like Bevilacqua promise to shun them to avoid getting burned in the future.

Bob Andersson , a vice president and general manager at Aggregate Industries of Saugus, which supplies dozens of towns in Eastern Massachusetts, told The Boston Globe recently that it is considering introducing clauses in new contracts that would allow the company to raise prices to cover sharply higher asphalt costs.