CRANBERRY TWP — Township officials are hoping to spend more of its annual road-paving budget on preventive maintenance in coming years.

Bob Howland with the township public works department told the supervisors Nov. 3 that spending money on crack sealing and thin overlays would extend the life of township roads by three or four years by keeping out salt and moisture.

“We’d like to really focus hard on some preventive maintenance factors,” he said.

Earlier this year, the township switched to a system where it rates all its roads on a scale of 1 to 10. A newly paved road starts as a 10 and typically loses one point each year. The average condition of its roads is 6.9, Howland said.

“Ninety percent of our roads are above a 5, so we’re in pretty good shape right now,” he said.

The cost to repave all of its roads rated 5 or lower would be about $11.5 million. However, doing preventive maintenance on newer roads can keep them in good condition for several years longer.

This year’s budget called for $1.2 million for road resurfacing, though the supervisors approved an additional $990,000.

Some communities defer spending money on their roads, but it is more cost-effective to do the preventive maintenance, Jerry Andree, township manager, said. “It’s easy to kick the can on this, but you know that can is going to come back and hurt you.”