LANSING—With inadequate state funding, many county road commissions are laying off workers, contracting out services and doing less work than in previous years.

The Michigan Department of Transportation has seen its budget reduced in recent years, said Director Kirk Steudle. Because funding is down for the entire department, many county road commissions, especially smaller ones, have taken a hit as well.

“The budget has hurt us very significantly,” said John Foss, manager of the Oceana County Road Commission. “Since 2004, our funding has gone down about 17.5 percent.”

Every county except one has a road commission separate from county government. In Wayne County, the road commission merged with the county’s general government in the 1980s.

Road commissions perform construction, repair and maintenance on roads and bridges. They also do snow removal, salting and sanding.

As a result of the budget woes, Foss said his commission has had to alter basic operations such as patching roads with a cheaper material than used in previous years.

The commission has also laid off employees, he added.

“Since 2004, we’ve gone from 49 employees to 44 to balance our budget,” Foss said. “Now we have to lose six more and get to 38.”

Manistee County Road Commission Manager Gerald Peterson can empathize. He said his commission’s funding has been cut roughly 15 percent in the last three years.

“We’ve reduced our full-time staff by seven and our front-office staff by almost 50 percent since 2000,” Peterson said. “We’re going to continue downsizing with the cost of doing business skyrocketing.”

Peterson emphasized that increased business costs are more detrimental to road commissions than budget cuts.

“You can’t just look at the decrease in revenue—the increase in expenditures is a bigger concern,” he said, citing the higher cost of basic materials such as gravel and salt.

“The revenue needs to stay with the cost of doing business, and the cost of doing business has increased by 72 percent over the last four years.”

Robert Young, manager of the Alcona County Road Commission, said funding has been down for three straight years—and he doesn’t see any end in sight.

“I’m anticipating the same for next year,” he said. “Quite frankly, the system is grossly underfunded.”

Young, who also serves as president of the County Roads Association of Michigan, said his biggest concern is that his agency will be without new equipment for the third consecutive year.

“We’ll do the best we possibly can,” Young said. “But when equipment starts breaking down, it makes things pretty tough.”

Young said his agency “typically” hires seasonal employees, a direction that Peterson is hesitant to go in but may be forced to without sufficient funding.

“We’re going to have to make changes, so we’ll look at seasonal employees in the winter and then have a regular staff in the summer,” Peterson said.

Foss went a step further, saying Oceana may contract out certain services.

“We’re considering bidding out our snow removal,” he said. “It all depends on the weather and if we’re overworked this winter—we got through last year alright, but it all depends on what kind of winter we have.”

Foss added that because of budget constraints, the wintertime duties of his agency have been cut down.

“We used to salt all the primary roads in the county,” he said. “But now, we can only salt the hills, curves and intersections on primary roads.”

Asked whether that could translate into a safety hazard, Foss said, “Absolutely.”

Young said he hopes that some kind of tax, on gas or otherwise, will be imposed so the Transportation Department will receive more funding.

“Legislators need to understand that they can’t keep taking transportation money away,” Young said. “Good roads are the foundation of our entire economy.”