The Lake County/City Area Planning Council has approved $80,334 in funding to the City of Clearlake for a bicycle lane along Burns Valley Road.
“Clearlake was unsuccessful in receiving a State Bicycle Transportation Account (BTA) grant,” said APC Executive Director Lisa Davey-Bates. “So they are desperate for funding, to even partially complete the project.”
The APC voted Wednesday, Aug. 9 in favor of the allocation to Clearlake, of which $50,320 was first allocated to Lakeport in Fiscal Years 1994-95 and 1996-97.
The City of Lakeport did not complete the project for which its allocation was designated and the APC voted on Wednesday, June 14 to rescind the allocation to Lakeport. Remaining funds in Wednesday”s allocation had previously been unprogrammed.
The City of Clearlake proposes to construct 1,300 feet of bikeway along the west side of Burns Valley Road between Olympic Drive and Bowers Road. An application for this project, which originally included roadway widening and curb, gutter and sidewalks, was submitted to the BTA; however, the application was not approved for funding according to Davey-Bates” staff report.
Davey-Bates noted that since Clearlake was unable to obtain the BTA funding, it now plans to reduce the project”s scope by constructing a bicycle lane adjacent to the existing paved roadway. In this way, the project will provide at least temporary pedestrian and bicycle access.
APC Chairman Aaron T-Holstine asked if there was any way to “keep back” the money for Clearlake to use as matching funds when applying for another grant instead of using it to complete the project piecemeal.
Davey-Bates said she didn”t believe that having the money would keep Interim City Engineer Bob Galusha from applying for additional funds. District 2 Supervisor Jeff Smith said the money would look good for Clearlake when submitting grant applications. Smith sits on the APC as a representative of county government.
Clearlake Vice Mayor Judy Thein, who also sits on the APC, noted that a Community Development Block Grant set-aside — in the amount of $138,000 — is also financing the project, as is a $30,940 contribution by the developer of Austin Manor.
Wednesday”s vote was unanimous to allocate funds to the City of Clearlake.
Contact Cynthia Parkhill at cparkhill@clearlakeobserver.com.
