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One of the largest budget items for Nicholas County is the road fund. Between the Rural Secondary Roads program and County Road Aid fund, over $1.6 million is allocated for the maintenance of county roads.

These programs are funded by motor fuel taxes and are paid to the county each year. It should be noted that road fund monies cannot be diverted and used for other purposes, such as a new roof for the hospital or courthouse maintenance.

The only exception is administrative costs. Each year, the state provides a worksheet that computes judge/executive and magistrate pay, insurance, and other county administrative costs and allows for a percentage of the road funds to be transferred for those purposes only. This percentage in recent years has been about 45 percent.

The Rural Secondary Program will be providing the county with $886,261 this year. However, the fiscal court will only be able to allocate $80,153 of this amount. The remainder will be utilized on state roads in the county by the state based on their assessment, with input by the fiscal court.

Two companies, CentiMark and Watertight Roofing submitted bids to the fiscal court for the replacement of the hospital roof.

CentiMark's bid came in at $140,516 with a 20 year warranty on labor and materials.

Watertight Roofing's bid was for $119,250 but only offered a 10-year waranty. Representing Watertight, Mr. John Cobb stated the material and work would be the same, but he felt the quality and age of the subroofing would impede the life of the roof. "I don't think you'll get 20 years out of it no matter who does the work," he said.

Magistrate Jeff Randolph felt strongly enough about the 20 year warranty that he felt it was worth the additional $20,000 investment and made a motion to accept CentiMark's bid. After a long delay, Magistrate Mike Webb seconded the motion to allow the motion to be brought to a vote. The motion was defeated 4-1, with only Mr. Randolph voting in favor.