I have to love this gas tax money.
How else could Navajo County splurge three dump trucks with a sticker price of $ 850,000?
Navajo County’s board of directors approved the purchase Tuesday without hesitation, with the cost being covered by the state-shared gasoline tax.
The 10-wheel dump trucks come complete with a snow plow and ash spreaders to maintain the district’s vast network of roads – many of them unpaved. The county maintains more than 700 miles of roads in a rural county that covers approximately 10,000 square miles.
If Navajo County were a state – it would be the 42nd largest – ahead of Maryland, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and New Jersey. Much of the county is part of the Navajo and White Mountain Apache Reservations, but the county also has maintenance contracts to maintain the roads in the reservations.
Public works director John Osgood told overseers that the three dump trucks will replace vehicles that have been in service for 20 to 30 years and have traveled more than 200,000 miles each. The aging dump trucks in the current fleet spend so much time in the workshop that they make road maintenance difficult and devour a lot of time for the district mechanics.
“They require a level of maintenance, downtime and cost that adversely affects fleet and road maintenance operations,” wrote Osgood.
The county will use a government purchase agreement to get a good price on the new dump trucks, which are critical to snow handling on the roads in winter – as well as ongoing maintenance and repair of roads.
However, it will take 8-10 months for the new trucks to be delivered once the county places their order.
Fortunately, the county is overwhelmed this year – thanks to a stronger-than-expected economy and millions of federal grants designed to help local governments weather the pandemic.
Arizona drivers pay 19 cents in state taxes for every gallon they buy, which is primarily used for building and maintaining state roads. Part of the money goes to the local jurisdictions for road projects. Arizona’s tax is currently the fifth lowest in the country. California has the highest gas tax in the country – about 61 cents a gallon.
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