In an emergency called city council meeting on Thursday afternoon, the Hogansville City Council approved $37,803.54 in additional funding to be spent on the ongoing FEMA-Green Avenue Project.

The additional spending will be in order to repair an additional portion of the storm sewer pipe that is being repaired than was previously anticipated, and will lead to the temporary closure of a portion of Green Avenue.

“We knew the damage underneath Green Avenue was undetermined [before the project began],” said City Clerk Lisa Kelly. “The original plan was for 160 feet of repair [to the storm sewer pipes] that would not have come into the roadway. There’s now an additional 60 feet that needs to be repaired that will go into the roadway that is in as bad or worse condition than the rest of it.” 

“That portion of the pipe is gone,” said Adam Price of Falcon Design Consultants, a hired consultant for the city. “The floods that were here several years ago, the 2015-16 floods, caused a lot of the big rocks in that pipe to get deposited there, it’s built up. We need to get that pipe completely out of there.”

City Manager David Milliron, Mayor Bill Stankiewicz and City Councilman Reginald Jackson were unable to attend the emergency called meeting, however Mayor Pro-Tem Theresa Strickland noted that Milliron and the city staff’s recommendation was to approve the additional funding.

“I’ll point that the staff recommendation is to do what the engineer is explaining to us,” Strickland said.

City Councilman Marichal Price asked how long Green Avenue would remain closed in light of this additional work.  The estimation was given at three days, depending on weather conditions.

“You’re gambling when you start pulling up 50-year-old-pipe out of the ground, you never know what you’re going to find,” Adam Price added. “You might find more problems.”