Memorial Drive in Winthrop has been in terrible disrepair for 17 years. Funding for the reconstruction was put off, and once the town thought they had saved enough money to have the job done, it was detected that an error of hundreds of thousands in the school budget was overspent. Therefore, the road repair was stalled. This waiting caused huge cracks to form and potholes to become so numerous that cars were having to have frequent alignments.

Then stupidity happened. Late October the project finally started — graters came, scrapped the road in adverse weather, and just left it. Rain came and more huge potholes formed, then snow came. In some places, a car could not stay on its side of the road. The road stayed that way until Nov. 26. State Paving Inc. showed up in freezing weather to lay asphalt.

I happened to drive down the road and was so angry that work was being done during the pending storm that I pulled over, asked to speak to the boss and had a discussion about the timing of the project that should have been done months ago. He was also very angry that the project had stalled. Both he and another worker told me it was a waste of money.

I immediately called the town manager and asked him to go speak to the boss who was at the job site. He said he would. State Paving workers were working fast to put down a layer as it was getting dark and snow was approaching.

This shows total stupidity on many fronts. I’m hoping other residents of Winthrop speak out and let the town hear about wasting our taxpayer money. I’m sure a lot of this work will have to be redone at out expense.

Debbie Sherman

Winthrop

(Editor’s note: An earlier version of this letter misstated the company doing the paving work. It was State Paving Inc.)

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