A Foxworth, Miss., contractor has been given the contract to overlay five streets in Vicksburg.

The Board of Mayor and Aldermen Dec. 8 awarded the project to Southern Paving LLC of Foxworth, which was the low bidder on the project with a bid of $170,521. Southern Paving was one of two contractors bidding on the project to pave Lummie Street, Oak Hill Drive, Jackson Street, Beulah Cemetery and Smith Hill Road in Ward 1. Central Asphalt was the other company, submitting a bid of $273,063.

After the Dec. 8 meeting, Ward 1 Alderman Michal Mayfield said some of the roads on the list were “in pretty bad shape; I know Jackson Street hasn’t been paved in 20 years or more and you have a couple of other streets on there where we’ve had to do punch-outs (work on utility lines).”

Mayfield said anytime the city deals with a street with underground utilities, they have to be examined to see what problems exist under the pavement.

Once city workers determine which streets can be paved without extra cost, “We try to get those first.”

Mayfield said the city also plans to pave the access roads in Beulah Cemetery, which is on the National Register of Historic Places. “We’ve been trying to get that on for years,” he said. “With all the work that’s been done there, we try to keep it passable.”

Mayfield said soil has sloughed off and threatened the roadbed in some areas.

“For so many years we haven’t been able to go in there and pave those streets and I think we have one or two areas where the road’s been undermined; they need to be fixed,” he said.

Mayfield said fixing the underlying problems is a priority before paving the streets.

“I wouldn’t dare go in there and just lay some pavement down because it wouldn’t last,” he said. “You’ve got to fix where the real problem is first. When you’re paving, you’d better make sure of what’s under that ground before you put some paving on because if not, you’ll be right back on it before you can blink an eye.”