KELSEYVILLE — The recently finished Merritt Road Bridge over Kelsey Creek will be dedicated to Lake County veterans on Friday.
“It”s a well-deserved dedication and a good way to honor our veterans. Lake County has a long-standing tradition of honoring its veterans, and this is just another example of that,” Dist. 5 Supervisor Rob Brown said.
The 290-foot long bridge is located in Brown”s district in Kelseyville. It crosses Kelsey Creek and is one of the main access routes to the Kelseyville, Soda Bay and Buckingham areas from Highway 29.
“It”s a big project, and it needed a deserving group to be dedicated to. I couldn”t think of any group that deserves it more,” Brown said.
Brown”s suggestion to dedicate the new bridge to Lake County”s veterans got the unanimous support of the county board of supervisors in December 2007, six years after the project got under way.
Lake County Veterans” Services Officer Jim Brown said the upcoming bridge dedication is one of the bigger dedications in Lake County, rivaling the Pearl Harbor Memorial flagpole in Dec. 7, 2001.
“It”s bigger because it”s coming from outside the veteran community, from the board of supervisors and the groups that have put it together. It shows that they were thinking enough about our veterans to do this, where veterans always take care of themselves,” Brown said.
Assistant Veterans” Services Officer Bob Penny said he contacted the Veterans of Foreign Wars chapters in Lakeport and Clearlake, the American Legion chapters in Clearlake and Kelseyville, the Disabled American Veterans Organization in Clearlake, the Pearl Harbor Survivors group, Vietnam Veterans Association of Lakeport and the Retired Officers Association in Lucerne, among other Lake County veterans groups.
“I know the North Bay Motorcycle Association is going to be there,” Penny said. He added the group is largely made up of veterans. The riders will cross the bridge following the cutting of a ribbon that will span the bridge”s mid-point, where two covered plaques will be unveiled.
Penny said the Lake County United Veterans Council Rifle Team will perform a rifle salute before the ribbon cutting.
More than 87 percent of the funding for the $3.4 million project came from the Federal Highway Administration”s Bridge Replacement Program, from a pot of money set aside for replacing low water crossings with bridges, according to Deputy Public Works Director Bob Lossius. Finished in December 2007, the bridge replaced a temporary concrete bridge constructed in 1985.
“Nobody was using it (the funds), so a request went out across the nation that says we have funds available, and if you”re interested you need apply,” Lossius said. Caltrans started asking if the county was interested in 2000. Former Public Works Director Gerry Shaul, Jr. requested funding in April 2001 for the bridge, according to Lossius.
Contact Tiffany Revelle at trevelle@record-bee.com.
