CAIRO — Grady County commissioners will consider outsourcing roadside mowing duties to a third party at a special workshop after bids to take on the service were tabled at a meeting earlier this week.

Each of the three bidders are offering to mow roadside grasses four times each year — once more than what the county currently offers annually, though the Road Department would still be responsible for maintenance around bridges. 

Commissioner June Knight, who has pressured the county for weeks to consider outsourcing mowing duties, said her intentions in investigating the matter are not to shed Road Department jobs.

“I’m not trying to get rid of employees,” Knight said at Tuesday’s meeting of the Board of Commissioners.

Knight noted that Road Department superintendent Stanley Elkins’ role sees him maintain roads, handle trash disposal, manage employees and oversee construction projects.

“You can’t do it all,” she told Elkins. “You’ve got to have some help.”

Elkins said the Road Department is sometimes unable to complete their mowing duties on a regular schedule due to unfavorable weather conditions and equipment malfunctions. Taking on an outside party to handle mowing would allow for greater reliability in when the service could be offered, he said.

A workshop to further discuss the matter has yet to be scheduled, though a decision may not necessarily be made soon due to the cooler winter temperatures slowing grass growth for the time being.

The suggestion that the commissioners workshop the idea came from Elkins, whose division typically handles mowing duties.

Elkins’ original recommendation that the Road Department take on an additional employee and mower to better handle the duties was previously shot down, with commissioners citing pricey equipment maintenance costs as a primary reason for why the service should perhaps no longer be handled in-house.

Commissioner Ray Prince agreed that the county should consider outsourcing some Road Department duties — just not mowing.

“If I’m going to spend some money on the outside, I’d rather do it with garbage,” he said.

One option the county may consider in regards to sanitation is to lease dump trucks through a third party in order to avoid the hefty costs of maintenance.

Of the county’s four existing dump trucks, “one is dead and one is dying,” said county finance director Holly Murkerson.

“That leaves us with two (trucks) that we’re trying to function with,” she said.

In addition to hauling garbage, the trucks are also used to transport dirt along Johnson Road and other projects along State Park Road and Tired Creek Lake.

“They’re just worn out,” Murkerson said.

Though the county can’t afford to buy a new vehicle, Murkerson and Elkins have been in contract with a Kentucky-based company that leases dump trucks as part of an effort to explore alternative options for the county. The county could lease a new truck for 12 or 18 months with the only money due being monthly interest payments. At the conclusion of the lease, the truck will be taken to auction, with the company returning at least 85 percent of the value to the county.

Murkerson said the expected cost of using the vehicle for a year would be about $7,000-$9,000. The final cost would not include maintenance since the vehicle would be leased.

The commissioners voted unanimously to allow Murkerson to investigate the option further.

Commissioner LaFaye Copeland said the concept of leasing large vehicles like dump trucks has been a matter that the BOC has been interested in pursuing for at least four years, but that “there was nothing out there.”

“So when (Murkerson) told me about this, I couldn’t believe it,” she said.

Copeland said she would be interested in pursuing the idea if it would save the county money.

The matter will be discussed further at the workshop.