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The Beaufort City Council is caught between a rock and a hard place. Last night, the members had to decide whether to spend two accounts — one earmarked for helping a blighted neighborhood, the other to help neighborhoods under water — to renovate yet another neighborhood with a federal grant that had a time limit attached to it.
In the end, the city did the right thing: It decided to move forward with the Bladen Street redevelopment program.
It's the right thing because we shouldn't throw away a federal grant, nor should we allow the streetscape project to jeopardize private redevelopment that's waiting in the wings by not acting now.
Borrowing money from the stormwater plan, well, that's going to need to be replenished. There's no timeline, and we don't necessarily know where that money will come from. It must be done, however. So, too, must the city and civic groups help the Northwest Quadrant help itself.
But the city needs to replenish UDAG. And it needs to address stormwater drainage.
Thoughts?
ck passante
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Champagne dreams on a beer budget. What else is new to Beaufort? Hopefully we won't have sinkholes on Boundry Street when the work is completed.
Questionable, at best. Why not price out the "ultra-sound" so to speak first, before filling the park with underground foam? Why have the sounding be secondary to "foaming?" The foam could possibly make the whole project "invisible" to the detection and reading devices, and, could, make the entirely new excavation a necessary evil. Wasted dollars?
Ah, well, let's see here... .
And of course, that's pertaining to the topic I had wanted to address the other day about the sinkholes in Waterfront Park.
Chris -
To address your question, I agree we should not loose federal money and to do so would be foolish, however, when we applied for the Grant, the matching funds should have been identified then.
This council lacks any forward thinking, any vision, it is evidenced in not only it's fiscal irresponsibilities, but also in in its governance overall. No one on council has demonstrated his/her ability to see what re-actions there are to their votes on issues.
You were not here when Bay Street screepscape also known as StreetGate, was undertaken. It was not until the project was underway, that SCE&G announced new power poles for Bay Street, everyone complained and the city announced it would need to "find" the money to bury the power on Bay Street, it "found" the money and the power lines are now underground, however a lot of the work completed had to be dug up and replaced, a prime example of lack of forward thought costing the citizens of Beaufort more money.
I am not sure I agree with the premise that Bladen needs to be streetscaped now because a private investor wishes to develop his property and the streetscape moving forward is instrumental to that end. We have long standing residents, Mrs. Horne comes to mind over in Mossy Oaks (Langhorne Drive), she has paid her taxes, been a great community citizen and the stormwater money was to assist her drainige issue, why are she and her tax paying neighbors less desreving than say a Trask/Tully investment yet to come out the ground on Bladen Street?
The UDAG money has been sitting un-used since Dataw came out of the ground, it was used to build the Dataw Sewage treatment plant on St.Helena and Alcoa re-paid the city the money, this is where the UDAG money originated. Someone needs to look and see in what ways that UDAG money can be spent and see what projects are in the highest need. I am not sure that Federal money from one program can be used as matching funds for another Federal grant???
A comprehensive needs assesment should be created and the City prioritize and fund accordingly, however that requires vision and as I stated earlier, this council lacks it.
In my opinion, stormwater management takes precedent over streetscape issues, however losing federal money makes no sense. But I ask, why were the matching funds not identified prior to the grant application being made?
Alton Aimar
It's a good point, and now that sentiment is on the table (and I agree, should have been all along).
My point (if it's a point) is this: Spend the money on the project that will generate money. The streetscape program can do that, assuming a stronger tax base grows from it and more tourists use this renovated gateway into the city.
Look, there are no two ways about it: NWQ is going commercial; it's where we want that commercial that's important. We've pointed out (and often vehemently) that UDAG is worth nothing if it's not spent revitalizing that area. The Bladen Street revamp qualifies. As for stormwater, we both are 100 percent correct (we agree): It needs to be done now.
the city needs to identify a funding source for it. In hindsight, it would have been prudent to ask the residents to foot the bill for Bladen during the hasty referendum passed this month. It's a drop in the bucket, comparatively. But if the city could have borrowed money to build city hall (remember the ultimatum: vote yes or pay?), then why not borrow to fix stormwater now?
As for NWQ, the UDAG money will have to be paid back, and that's a good thing. But there are some civic programs (one, in particular, mentioned in the story) that needs the civic volunteers and participation from those living in NWQ.
ck
CP -
Now you know as well as I do, that Mayor Rauch was not about to do anything to jepordize his pet Muni Complex project and adding Bladen St Re-vamp, Stormwater, etc to the referendum would have caused a stir. I do have to ask though, if the city were participating in the County Stormwater program, would the stormwater issues not be addressed?