By Jack Underwood, Staff Writer
The city of Warrenton will be reallocating nearly $900,000 in funds after receiving grant approval from MoDOT to help cover the cost of a recently completed sidewalks project on Veterans Memorial Parkway.
That decision was approved by the Warrenton Board of Aldermen at their Oct. 1 meeting at the recommendation of City Administrator Brandie Walters.
The city had previously accepted bids for two phases of a project improving the sidewalks along Veterans Memorial Parkway on the west side of town extending first from Market Street to the east entrance of the Shoppes at Warrenton and further west to the Rural King entrance on the west side of the shopping center.
The city awarded two contracts totaling just over $1 million to S&A Equipment and Builders to repave those sidewalks, and concurrently, applied for two Transportation Alternative Program Grants from the Missouri Department of Transportation to help offset the cost.
TAP Grants are awarded to municipalities and used for transportation enhancements, recreational trails, safe routes to school and scenic byways according to MoDOT’s website. They also allow the state to cover up to 80% of the costs associated with the projects.
At the Oct. 1 meeting, Walters said the costs of those projects came in at roughly $770,000 leaving some funds left over. On top of those savings, the grant money from MoDOT covered an additional $570,000 of the project’s costs, according to Walters, leaving significant funding left over.
She asked the board to reallocate the savings from the fund for the project to cover needs she felt the city would have to address in the future.
“We are asking for a budget adjustment, … When we do the wastewater treatment expansion, they’re going to need a new tractor out there for the dry sludge, as well as a loader to load that dry sludge,” said Walters.
She went on to say that the tractor currently being used at the wastewater plant is outdated and they do not have a loader to help with their work at the moment. She was also looking to purchase a new truck for the public works department.
The tractor would come at a cost of just over $200,000 and would be purchased from a local co-op, allowing the city to avoid handling the bidding process itself.
“That is actually through a co-op, so we don’t have to put those up for bid,” said Walters. “We purchase them through the co-op at the lowest price because they already do all the bidding for us.”
After questioning from the board, she also assured them that the truck would be purchased locally off a lot as well. She said she had budgeted roughly $45,000 for the truck and would also like to spend $15,000 of the money to fix a sewer camera that is in need of repair.
She said she wanted to hold off on spending the remainder since while they had been approved for the grant at the time of the meeting they had not actually received the funds yet.
“I really just want to do those top few, the camera repairs, the tractor and possibly a truck right now,” said Walters. “Until those grant funds come in I don’t want to spend that money.”
She also elaborated that once they do receive the grant funds she hoped to allocate the majority of those monies toward purchasing and installing more cured-in-place-pipe lining (CIPP), to rehabilitate the city’s infrastructure.
That lining is used to effectively create a new pipe inside of an older one and extend the useful life of aging infrastructure, but those decisions will have to come at a later date when the grant money is received.