ASHLAND — The Ashland County Sheriff’s Office is refreshing its fleet.
The Ashland County Board of Commissioners on Thursday authorized the purchase of three 2026 Dodge Durangos for use by the sheriff’s office. Each vehicle cost $41,465 for a grand total of $124,395.
The vehicles will be paid for out of the sheriff’s office budget.
“We budget for the sheriff’s department to have three new vehicles per year. We’ve done that for the last three years now,” said Ashland County Commissioner Denny Bittle.
“It keeps our vehicles up to date. We have around 30 vehicles out there that they use, so they always take the highest mileage (vehicles) out of service,” Bittle said.
If any of the three vehicles taken out of service are still “usable,” it sometimes can be repurposed into a transport vehicle, he said.
“It’s a program that’s really been for the safety of our officers as much as anything, because some of the equipment that they used to run was pretty ragtag,” Bittle said.
Each vehicle comes with a three-year warranty, he said.
Jail drains in need of repair
Commissioners also accepted a $16,460 quote from Sloan Concrete for repairs to the sally port drains at the Ashland County Jail. The work will be paid for out of the county’s jail operations fund, according to the board.
Sally ports are the areas where individuals are brought into and processed before being taken into the jail.
Bittle said the ports are also where sheriff’s office vehicles are cleaned.
“Over the last 25 years some of the concrete has raised inside there so they can’t open some doors. They have to replace some doors and then they have to do some concrete work, plus (work to) the drain system that’s in there,” he said.
The metal drain system is rusting, Bittle said. It will be cut out and replaced with a new system. The work should be done by the end of April, he said.
County opens bids for road sealing project
The county opened bids about a month ago (March 5) for its annual road sealing work.
About 45 to 55 miles of road around are sealed each year. The county plans to seal about 42 miles in 2026, said Ashland County Engineer Ed Meixner.
Three bids were opened March 5 for the project, estimated by Meixner to cost $268,000.
Melway Paving of Holmesville and Sarver Paving of Ashland originally submitted the same apparent low bid of $235,000. Small’s Asphalt Paving of Gambier submitted the third bid at $361,900.
Meixner recommended all three bids be rejected to give each another chance to resubmit, as well as break up the tie.
Melway and Sarver both submitted new bids for the project.
Sarver submitted the apparent low bid at $230,235.50 — about $5,000 less than its first bid in March. Melway’s bid came in at $237,300 — a $2,300 increase from its March bid.
Meixner said he’ll review the bids and give his recommendation to commissioners.
