• David Tewes •
• Originally published January 2, 2009 at 11:21 p.m., updated January 2, 2009 at 11:21 p.m.

When lifelong Victoria resident Jesse Perez looks at the condition of Victoria's streets today, he can't help but conclude they have improved.

"We've come a long way, because I can remember a lot of the roads used to be nothing but gravel," said Perez, 60. "Now all of a sudden everything is paved."

He believes the north side of Victoria has seen the most improvement in streets, but he said the city has made progress even on the south side.

And it's not by accident that the city decides which streets will get rebuilt or receive routine maintenance.

Public Works Director Lynn Short said probably the two most important factors in getting the process started are checking the city's street inventory and the condition of utilities under the streets.

The street inventory is a document updated yearly, rating the condition of each city street in Victoria. Once the city staff has checked the street rating, the utilities are investigated next.

"If the utilities are really bad and there's no funding available, we hate to build a new street on top of them," Short said. "Quite often, we would delay that until we could get the financing available to do them at the same time."

Beyond that, the staff factors in the cost of the project, the money available, traffic volumes and how many houses and businesses are served by the street.

A recommendation is then forwarded to the city council, typically in the spring. "Ultimately it's the council that makes the decisions," Short said.

Mayor Pro Tem Lewis Neitsch said he has his own routine for deciding which streets recommended by the staff need paving.

The first step he takes is to drive the street to check the condition for himself. He then checks notes he's made based on comments from constituents during the past year.

"Then I will come back and look at the street inventory and see how they rated them," he said. Much the same as staff, he also factors in the availability of money, traffic, and houses and businesses served.

But Neitsch said the basis of his decision hinges largely on the street inventory.

It's an empirical document that takes the guesswork out of deciding how to spend the taxpayers' dollars, he said.

"I've got mine in my truck," he said. "I carry it with me all the time."

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