Bend crews hustle to patch potholes, avoid city bill

Filling potholes in Central Oregon has been a repetitive and thankless job this winter. Many potholes have been filled several times already this season, but since the city of Bend has to use a temporary mix in the winter, they keep breaking open.

The city has a policy on reimbursing damages caused by potholes on city streets. It uses an outside insurance company to handle liability claims.

The city pays a monthly premium to the insurance company instead of paying out of pocket for potential reimbursements.

“If the pothole is filled within 48 hours, which is the city’s standard operating procedure, the city is not considered liable for those damages,” city Risk Claims Manager Brenda Mingus explained Monday. “Because we’re not negligent, and we followed our standard operating procedures.”

A manager at Les Schwab Tires in Bend said the company hasn’t seen a noticeable rise in pothole-induced damage, compared to years past.

He also gave some advice on how to protect against pothole damage.

“Air pressure is the best protection as far as damaging the vehicle, damaging the wheel, damaging the tire,” Joe Wheeler said. “A properly inflated tire is going to hold up much better than an under-inflated tire.”

As of late Monday morning, Les Schwab had already handled five pothole cases, but that does have a little to do with the weekend backlog.

These potholes in town could be a lot greater in number, had Bend not preemptively filled a bunch of them in the fall.

The city said it has filled every reported pothole this winter and last within 48 hours of learning about it, and thus have not had to pay for any vehicle damages.