The Medical Lake City Council approved a revised interlocal agreement with the Spokane Regional Transportation Council at its Tuesday, March 19 meeting.
City Administrator Doug Ross said the agreement didn’t really have much influence in Medical Lake, as it deals with distributing federal grant funds. In the city limits, only the arterials would be considered for some work.
“They divvy out federal grant funds, for the most part,” he said. “We aren’t traditionally eligible for federal grant funds because we’ve repaired all of our arterials, or reconstructed all of our arterials, and that’s the only thing we’re really eligible for grant funding.”
Councilman Art Kulibert, who also serves as the City Council’s representative to the Spokane Transit Authority, said the transit agency would be approving the same proposal in the near future. One section of the agreement includes projects that meet the needs of senior citizens and disabled residents. Kulibert said STA receives a large amount of money for servicing areas that have higher populations of those residents, which includes Medical Lake.
“They’ve been receiving a significant amount of money to maintain the bus route to Medical Lake,” he said. “Two years ago we were very close to losing bus service, and they were able to apparently get the grant at that time, and they will also have qualified for renewal this next year.”
Kulibert said a large reason why bus services weren’t completely cut from the city was because of the money received from that portion of the agreement.
Also at the meeting, the City Council approved a two-year extension of an agreement with E and H Engineering, Inc. for public works projects. The new contract runs through 2014. Ross said the agreement comes at a time when there are two projects in the works needing continuity: the completion of sidewalk construction along SR 902 and the upcoming renewal of the city’s six-year water system plan.
Councilman AJ Burton was also selected as the Mayor Pro Tem for the City Council this year.
In addition to other council business, the fire department announced Todd Kirwin was joining as a new volunteer.
James Eik can be reached at james@cheneyfreepress.com.
Reader Comments(0)