By JON HARRISON/Staff Writer

Tuesday night, Jan. 5, the Pelham City Council approved a project to replace Pelham City Hall’s roof replaced of ongoing leaking issues.

City Council President Rick Hayes, and Mayor Gary Waters swapped jokes about the leaky roof in the council meeting on Tuesday saying things like, “well it’s only leaked since the day we got it, but before that it worked just fine.”

Tom Seale, Pelham’s finance director, was very optimistic about the plan for the new roof.

“The last time the roof was replaced was about 15 years ago,” said Seale. “And the building was actually built in 1973, so this is an expected expense.”

The leaking in the roof became increasingly worse throughout 2014.

“This time last year we had some quick repairs done and that has just been deteriorating since then,” said Seale. “We decided to work in funds for a new roof into the 2015 budget which was approved last night at the city council meeting.”

Hayes made several comments in the City Council work session and in the meeting about how much the city of Pelham had saved on the roof.

The projected budgeted amount was $100,00 and the actual bid the city accepted was for $57,300, saving the city $42,700.

“The roofer came in and actually did some quick repairs before the rain came in this last week and weekend,” said Seale. “So the most that we have had to do was just put some garbage cans under the spots that were leaking.”

There was no projected timeline discussed at the meeting but the hope is for construction to begin as soon as possible.

“I’m not a roofer but hopefully they will be able to start work next week and be done in the next few weeks, if the weather permits,” said Seale.