The dicey conditions that plagued Joe Luksza's dead-end road this winter steered him and his 2002 Pontiac Trans Am down an unexpected path: a run for town government.

With about 20 residences spread over less than a mile, Dunbarton's Rangeway Road has one driving lane, rolls over a few steep hills and, depending on the season, can be found sheathed in a layer of dirt, ice or mud.

As Luksza sees it, the town wasn't fulfilling its responsibility to keep the Class IV road safe - at least not until he presented town officials with copies of the state law requiring municipalities to keep roads safe and passable. If they aren't, the town could be held liable.

"Every time I've asked for sand, it's been total ice," said Luksza, who claimed there was a four-day period the road was so bad he couldn't get into his driveway. "They act like I'm a jerk for saying it. We're not being treated properly."

Since last spring, Luksza said he's made three complaints about Rangeway's hazardous state to the town's road agent, Jeff Crosby. When the road isn't sanded for days after a storm, it turns to ice and is "exceedingly treacherous," said Luksza, who doesn't have four-wheel drive on either the Trans Am or the Oldsmobile Intrigue that he calls the "Battle Tank."

He said he complained to Crosby again last month when the road went unsanded after another storm. Afterward, it was sanded twice in one day, Luksza said, with a sand-salt mixture that turned that dirt road into a muddy pile of slush. Luksza said he believes Crosby used the mixture maliciously.

When he raised the issue with selectmen Chairman Les Hammond, Luksza said he was instructed to elect a new road agent and that, if he wanted to live on Rangeway Road, unsafe conditions were just a part of life, according to Luksza.

A few days later when he brought his concerns before all the board members, Luksza said, he was "basically told to get lost."

"I asked them to be reasonable," Luksza said. "I was told, 'That's a one-lane dirt road, and it's always going to stay that way.' "

All but one of the three board members refused to even look over Luksza's complaint, he said, and that's why he decided to run for one of two open seats.

"If they can't follow the rules or listen to the taxpayers, what kind of other decisions are you making?" Luksza said.

Hammond denied telling Luksza the road was his problem and defended Crosby as a good road agent.

"We've had no complaints from anybody else on that road, or anyone in town, for that matter," Hammond said, explaining that Dunbarton's five dirt roads are less of a priority than main routes after a storm. "We can only be one place at a time. But the policy is, the guys get called out and stay until the roads are done."

Dunbarton has one plow truck and hires five independent contractors to clean up after snowstorms, said Hammond, who plows for the city of Concord as a contractor.

Several neighbors farther up on Rangeway Road said they didn't have complaints about road maintenance this winter.

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