Fred Thiele wants to make sure part of a gravel road located near Clearwater is not forgotten by Antelope County.

The rural Clearwater resident was the only member of the public to speak up on the county’s one-year and six-year road improvement plan during the commissioners’ meeting Tuesday, Sept. 1, in Neligh.

Before Thiele gave his input, county highway superintendent Brian McDonald spoke to the commissioners about the road improvement plan and its corresponding map of projects.

“This is part of your requirement with your gas tax money,” McDonald said. “Essentially, we’ve got to maintain records and show how we spent gas tax money.

“We’ve got to have a one- and six-year road program,” he said. “Basically, this is what your plan is to spend it.”

He explained now was the time for the commissioners to hear from the public on the road improvement plan.

“Essentially, this is the hearing that’s if you want to add a project, change the one- and six- from what I have here, it’s up to you guys to do that,” McDonald said.

“Essentially, this is the time to take input from the public if they want changes to this or whatever,” he said.

Board chair Charlie Henery asked for public comments. That is when Thiele stood up to give his input.

“I didn’t know if 516 Avenue going north of Clearwater was going to be on this,” Thiele said. “That’s where I’m interested in.”

McDonald noted two projects to improve 516 Avenue near Clearwater – one each north and south of town – were included on the one-year part of the road improvement plan.

Thiele was curious about what the county had planned for about a mile-and-a-half stretch of 516 Avenue leading up to Clearwater and St. Theresa’s Catholic cemeteries.

Those cemeteries are located near the intersection of 516 Avenue and 854 Road, about two miles north of Clearwater.

County road superintendent Aaron Boggs noted that particular stretch of 516 Avenue was overlaid with a crushed rock base earlier this summer to establish a foundation for future road building.

“We’ve got to see what the road’s going to do first,” Boggs said. “We talked about seeing what it does for a year.”

Thiele, who lives about a mile north of Clearwater, recalled attending the commissioners’ meeting when that decision was made.

“I agree with you on that,” Thiele said. “The dust is just horrendous right now. I don’t know what you can do about it. It’s dry. The road’s getting a lot rougher.”

He noted he had attended a funeral recently at one of the cemeteries north of Clearwater.

“If the wind would’ve been out of the other direction, everybody standing there in a white shirt would have been red by the end of the day,” Thiele said.

Henery asked whether the stretch of 516 Avenue that Thiele was concerned about needed to be added to the road improvement plan.

“That’s your guys’ call,” McDonald said. “This is your guys’ plan. Just because it’s on the one- and six- doesn’t mean it gets done in the one-year plan. Essentially before you can do it, it has to be on there.”

Boggs noted adding another mile and a half of 516 Avenue to the road improvement plan would create a new project.

“People from Clearwater deserve a good road to the cemeteries,” Thiele said. “Every other town gets a good road to the cemeteries eventually.

“I know that’s what we’re looking for,” he said. “It’s not going to happen tomorrow, but I think it should be in the plan.”

Henery reminded Thiele why the county ground and added a crushed rock base to the stretch of 516 Avenue that Thiele was concerned about.

“We knew that it would be dusty, but we need to get a base established on that before we do anything else,” Henery said.

“There’s no sense in spending $2 million to put a road across that unless you’ve got a base to put it on,” he said. “That’s why we did it.”

“I’m not arguing that point,” Thiele said. “I just want to make sure that we keep something in the plans.”

Thiele asked whether his request would be added to the county’s road improvement plan. Henery said the commissioners could decide to do that.

Thiele noted people needed to be aware of all of the heavy truck traffic traveling and kicking up dust in the area.

“It’s dangerous right now, so I wanted somebody to stay on top of it,” Thiele said.

“But the base of the road is holding together really good,” Henery said. “That’s what we’re trying to establish. That’s why we did that.”

McDonald noted improving that particular stretch of 516 Avenue north of Clearwater could cost about $750,000.

“As far as what needs to take place as far as changes, if you want to add that, it’d be basically a rough mile and a half,” McDonald said. “I would say you’re probably adding that to the six-year plan, but that’s your guys’ call.”

Before the commissioners voted on the county’s road improvement plan, board member Carolyn Pedersen asked about a project listed under the plan’s six-year part.

The roughly $150,000 project was described as the building of a new road on about a mile of 515 Avenue on the western edge of Clearwater.

Commissioner Eli Jacob had previously brought that stretch of road up as a potential truck route around Clearwater.

“That can probably be taken off now,” Jacob said.

The commissioners decided this project was no longer needed in the road improvement plan because Clearwater soon will no longer be home to a Summerland Public School site.

A new educational facility for students in pre-kindergarten through 12th grade is being constructed near the intersection of 513 Avenue and Summerland Road, in rural Antelope County, between Clearwater, Ewing and Orchard.

“I was just trying to get traffic away from the school and the town,” Jacob said.

Commissioner Dean Smith made a motion to approve a resolution saying the board adopted the county’s road improvement plan with two changes. Jacob seconded Smith’s motion.

The five commissioners unanimously approved the resolution, which included the addition of a mile and a half of 516 Avenue north of Clearwater and the removal of the project for a new road on the west side of Clearwater.