GACKLE, N.D. (VNL) – “This is too much money for a town this small to put on the backs of people. It’s going to break people, it’s going to absolutely break people,” says Johnny Lybrand, resident in Gackle.

A multi-million dollar special assessment proposal in the small town of Gackle North Dakota has a lot of people concerned.

“Our roads are shot, they are beyond being pothole fixed,” says former mayor George Elhard.

Citizens tell Valley News Live that roadways do need to be fixed, but not four million dollars worth.

“I don’t feel we need to tear up every street in town and spend four million dollars,” says Randy Miller, Resident of Gackle for 15 years.

Interstate Engineering, the engineers on the project say they’re making a conservative effort to get the best and the longest lasting fix for the roadways.

But it’s not cheap.

“There’s a lot of people that aren’t going to be able to afford it. We have a lot of senior citizens that live one social security check to the next,” says Miller.

“I have friends in this town that live off of $900 to $2,000 a month. Something like this will absolutely destroy them,” says Lybrand.

Miller says it’s a tough financial burden to a few property owners within Gackle and there are some property owners who don’t even live here full-time.

“Out of 202 property owners in this town, 70 of them live out of the city, a lot of them live out of the state,” says Miller.

But other citizens of Gackle say that it’s an overdue burden that needs to be done, despite the cost.

This is because they say it’ll decide the future of the town.

Miller, along with others, are trying to get 50 percent of property owners to sign a petition to squash this assessment before Monday’s city council meeting.

During this meeting, the proposed special assessment will be discussed.