State kicks off first stimulus-funded road project

The $787 billion federal stimulus has begun to boost Georgia’s roadbuilding industry.

On Tuesday state and federal transportation officials gathered in Hapeville to celebrate the first stimulus-funded road project to go under construction in metro Atlanta, a repaving expected to pump $940,841 into the Georgia economy.

The project is to pave 4.2 miles of Ga. Hwy. 3, a commercial corridor in Clayton and Fulton counties near Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport. Contractors said work is scheduled to begin Monday night.

Officials with C.W. Matthews Contracting Co., which won the bid for the work, said it would enable the company to keep about 25 of its own employees on the payroll for the length of the project, and would probably double that or more when secondary jobs like quarry workers, truck drivers, line-painters and traffic signal crews were taken into account.

“A tough decision would have had to be made” if the stimulus hadn’t filled the breach for those employees, said Bill White, vice president of asphalt construction at C.W. Matthews. Georgia is getting about $1.1 billion for transportation from the stimulus.

Gov. Sonny Perdue, state Transportation Commissioner Vance Smith and others joined John Porcari, President Obama’s deputy secretary of transportation, for the groundbreaking in Hapeville.

The officials at the podium presented a bright picture, but behind the scenes it’s more complicated. Negotiations between DOT and Perdue’s office broke down over power-sharing under a new law. And with accounting troubles battering DOT’s road program, its contract spending would be nearly at a standstill if not for the stimulus.

Perdue said he was concerned for Georgia roadbuilding once the stimulus funding runs out, but not only for roadbuilding. “I’m concerned about what will happen when the stimulus funds disappear in all areas of state government,” he said.