Harvard approved a 1% sales tax for roads. Now the city is deciding what streets to fix first

Since Harvard began collecting its voter-approved, 1% sales tax for roads, sidewalks, curbs and stormwater projects, it has brought in an estimated $960,000, City Manager Lou Leone said.

The first project those funds are earmarked for, approved by the City Council this week, is repaving Ayer Street this summer. The city is in the process of determining what comes next.

“We spent 2024 collecting the 1% [tax], now we need a plan for what we need to do” for the city’s streets, Leone said.

Voters approved the sales tax during the April 2023 municipal elections on a 60% to 40% margin. An attempt the previous June during the primary election failed by a 36% to 64% margin.

With those funds now in hand, the city’s engineering firm is creating a master plan for road reconstruction, using core samples it has collected to show how each street’s foundation is holding up or if it even has one, Leone said.

Once the plan is in place, Leone and Mayor Mike Kelly hope to leverage those sales tax receipts to do more projects on a faster schedule.

“We can accelerate how fast we can attack the roads by bonding out the revenue stream ... to do as much work as quickly as possible,” Kelly said. Kelly is running for reelection on April 1, up against write-in challenger Paul Hereley.

The plan, if approved by the City Council, is to sell construction bonds and use the sales tax income to pay off the bonds.

“We are changing from throwing asphalt down ... to preserving what we have and following a master plan.”

—  Lou Leone, Harvard city manager

“Instead of doing a little bit each year over five years, we can do five years in one year” by selling bonds, Kelly said.

“We are changing from throwing asphalt down ... to preserving what we have and following a master plan,” Leone said.

Before the 2023 sales tax referendum, the city had a pavement survey completed. That survey indicated Harvard street conditions averaged a score of 38 out of 100.

The master plan starts with core samples. Over the past few months, the city’s engineering firm has taken 50 core samples to determine each street’s substructure.

“Some streets don’t even have a substructure,” Leone said, pointing to Eastman Street as an example. That route has absolutely no substructure, he said.

“Without knowing your substructure, whatever you throw on top of that will fail. You are wasting money at that point,” Leone said.

The construction bond plan would have the city sell a six-year, $3.9 million bond, with a front-loaded, $716,000-a-year note that drops to $125,000 in the final year, Leone said. Once that bond is paid off, the city would sell another bond with a similar payback plan.

If the economy shifts and Harvard’s sales tax income drops “we don’t have to do the next bond,” Leone said, and can switch to “a plan B, and only resurface where the substructure is adequate,” he said.

By selling bonds for the road projects, the city also benefits from an economy of scale – a better price for a larger construction package versus multiple smaller bids.

Officials also plan a methodical approach to the roads by dividing the city into quadrants. Two north-south and two east-west roads would be completed per quadrant until each area has had that work done.

“That is equality, so everyone gets new roads,” Leone said.

“We will know, once the master plan is done, what needs to be done,” Leone said, adding the plan also removes any emotion as to what areas gets their streets done first, but is instead based on need. “It is strictly based on whose road are the worst and now much money needs to be spent on them.”

The master plan’s engineering contract is funded by the sales tax income. The City Council will need to approve the final master plan and any bond sales, Kelly said.