Dallas D-coded

Q. Some of our streets have been under construction for years. Why does it take so long to fix our roads? -W. C., Dallas

A. Several factors come into play, says Mark Ball, spokesman for the Dallas District of the Department of Transportation. “The biggest reason that it appears to take so long is that we’re working while cars are still using the road,” Ball says. “We could complete Central Expressway in half the time if we could close it down. But you can imagine the outcry if we did that. ” Then there’s weather (road crews can’t pour concrete if it is raining or below 40 degrees) and the general competence of the contractor. State laws require road contracts to be awarded to the low bidder-not the most efficient bidder. “If we could award contracts to the companies we know are going to do a heck of a job, we could do everything much faster,” Ball says. “But we’d be criticized because they would also be more expensive.”

Q. How do prisoners in Dallas jails eat? It must be a huge job feeding them. -J. P., Dallas

A. They get three meals a day (2,800 calories total) including such exotica as sweet-and-sour chicken over rice, but nobody’s breaking into jail for the food. The 6,500 prisoners in the seven detention facilities of the Dallas Sheriffs Department are fed from the Central Jail Kitchen in far West Oak Cliff, a departure from the tradition of each lockup having its own kitchen and kitchen staff. Sheriff Captain R.A. Daberko, the facility’s director, is trying to develop a course of studies with El Centra College for the hundred or so prisoners who work in the kitchen, hoping to start some of them on a career in food service.