Co-Line seeks Jasper County assistance for paved roadway near $4M expansion

Jasper County is taking the lead on a project that would pave a section of roadway for Co-Line Manufacturing, a metal fabricator that has made significant investments in its facilities the past few years and operates directly on the county line between Jasper and Mahaska.

Jasper County Engineer Michael Frietsch said Co-Line approached the secondary roads department about extending the paving. Currently, the concrete pavement ends about a quartermile west of T-33. Co-Line wants to expand even further toward the west on the Mahaska County side.

“So now their entrances to their new business they’re expanding on are going to go onto the gravel, which is not going to be good,” Frietsch said. “We’re going to get a lot of truck traffic on that gravel. So we basically approached them about … how can we pave another quarter mile of that road.”

In response, the county drafted a memorandum of understanding with Co-Line and Mahaska County. The manufacturer then reached out to the state regarding the Revitalize Iowa’s Sound Economy (RISE) Grant Program. Frietsch said Co-Line is now putting together an application for the RISE Grant.

As part of the application process, Jasper County and Mahaska County have to pass resolutions stating their participation in the RISE Grant. According to the resolution included in county documents, the improved roadway supports Co-Line’s more than $4.25 million expansion, which will create 25 new jobs.

In addition to agreeing to pave an adequately designed roadway, the county also agrees to pay the matching funds identified in the grant application for the roadway project. Frietsch said the good thing about this grant program is that the project does not have to be let through the Iowa Department of Transportation.

“It can be done through a local letting process like we’ve done on East 142nd Street South, like we’ve done on T-22,” Frietsch said. “…We can probably expect 50 percent coverage on the project with this grant. That means the two counties, Mahaska and Jasper, will have to come up with a quarter and a quarter.”

But he has seen some matches as low as 20 percent. Frietsch stressed that, worse case scenario, the county would have to produce about $100,000 in funding for the roadway project. Supervisors had no issue passing a resolution in support of the grant and opting in to the project.

During the Oct. 15 board of supervisors meeting, Frietsch noted the memorandum of understanding with Mahaska County has not been presented yet. But the county engineer said that legal document will establish who is the lead county on the project and how the two governing bodies will split costs.

“At this point right now, we’re going to take the lead on this project,” he said. “The Mahaska County engineer agrees with me and he’s going to let us run with it. In fact we’ve already completed surveying of the road yesterday … on T-33 all the way down to the bridge and the centerline as well.”