Jeanerette spending $250K to resurface "worst roads"

JEANERETTE, La. (KLFY) -- The worst roads in Jeanerette will soon look and feel brand new. It's thanks to a quarter of a million-dollar project, which finished its first street on Tuesday.

Six months ago, Mayor Carol Bourgeois and Jeanerette city leaders identified the streets in the poorest condition within each ward, and from a list of 25, engineers surveyed each one and determined Minville Boulevard was in the worst shape, according to Jeanerette Mayor Carol "Bro" Bourgeois.

He told News 10, "We had just a variation of complaints and understandably so. Folks expect city hall or city services to provide those things that they need for a good community, and certainly good surfaces, good streets is one of those things."

Four streets will be resurfaced in Phase One. Those four are Minville Blvd., Druilhet Road, Martin Luther King Drive, and Bourg Street. A combination of the American Rescue Plan and city funds will cover the $250K project, which requires over 1,000 tons of asphalt.

Bourgeois stated that some of the mill material on the streets is being used to resurface a bad road to the sewer plant. "We were very frugal on the dollar, and we also took some of the material and used it again."

Each street is being resurfaced concurrently. Bourgeois can't announce the next locations but made certain the worst streets got covered first.

"It's been long overdue, much needed, but Jeanerette is in a much better position today fiscally speaking, monetarily speaking, and we're just trying to administer, administrate things to the best of our abilities," Mayor Bourgeois concluded.

Other upgrades planned for Jeanerette include their sewer and water systems. Mayor Bourgeois is also looking toward blighted property and trash next.