Trying Times

If J & J Boring, of Winfield, Missouri had a web site, I'd link to it. But, they don't. I didn't turn up much in Google for them, either. So I guess this will be the first and only review of their work available on the Internet. In a word, I am displeased.

They are a subcontractor to XL Contracting who is the prime contractor to the Metropolitan Sewer District (MSD) in the ongoing sewer project in my back yard. So their level of accountability is what you would expect from a sub to a sub, which is to say, none at all.

The digging began on Halloween, and within a few days, J & J had arrived with their equipment to begin boring a 488 foot tunnel underneath highway 270 which is adjacent to my property. Our representative at MSD went out of his way to let us know they were doing everything they could to save the tree in the southeast corner of our yard. Despite protests from J & J that it would make their job too difficult, they were ordered to work around the tree.

As you can see in the surveillance video (yes, that's right MSD, the whole project is being videotaped!), the crane is having to swing out across my fenceline (away from the camera) in order to move the dirt out of, and sections of pipe into, the pit. This was apparently being complicated by a different tree (on my property), and so the fine workmen of J & J fired up their chainsaw and removed it. Well, they cut it down anyway. They didn't remove it, it's still there leaning against the tree next to it. I guess they were determined to tear down a tree. Whether it was the one next to pit or not didn't matter, but some tree had to go.

I placed a call to Steve Welnick, who is the Division Inspector at MSD, to voice my displeasure with this act. Steve seems like a nice enough guy, but I have the same amount of respect for him that I have for any bureaucrat at any government agency, which is to say, none at all. So we will see if he lives up to the agreement he sent me in writing that says MSD will notify me from now on before any trees are removed from my property.