Carson City may get $700K a year grant for roads

Carson City has found one new source of funding for roads maintenance.

The city could receive as much $700,000 annually in federal funding that goes through the Nevada Department of Transportation (NDOT).

The Surface Transportation Block Grant annually goes to all 50 states’ transportation departments.

NDOT is required to provide some of the money to Washoe and Clark counties.

Now, it may be also allocating about $3.1 million to smaller urban areas with populations between 5,000 and 200,000.

The Carson metropolitan area, comprised of Carson City and parts of Douglas and Lyon counties, would get a third of that, or about $1 million.

If that portion of money is divvied up based on population, Carson City would take 70 percent or $700,000.

“While not an extreme amount of money or enough to fill our needs it is a positive thing,” said Patrick Pittenger, transportation manager, at the Transportation Resource Advisory Forum For Carson City (TRAFCC) meeting Tuesday.

The funds can be used on more heavily traveled arterial and connector streets only, and not smaller neighborhood roads.

The needed agreement with NDOT and another agreement between the counties will be presented to the Carson Area Metropolitan Planning Organization for approval at its meeting Dec. 14.

If the city gets the money, the first year’s funding would be used to reconstruct about half a mile of Silver Sage Drive, from Clearview Drive to Snyder Avenue, according to Pittenger.

The city is looking into other sources of funding to fix its roads since the gas tax indexing ballot question failed in November.

If the measure had passed, it was projected to raise about $40 million over 10 years for maintaining the city’s streets.

Nick Marano, city manager, told the TRAFCC panel city staff will be presenting alternatives for raising additional funds for road maintenance to the Board of Supervisors.

Pittenger said the city will likely have a budget of about $1.6 million in fiscal year 2018 for streets maintenance.

TRAFCC, the citizen’s panel established in May to give the city feedback on projects and priorities, will likely continue into next year.

The group was initially set to meet monthly through 2016, but members expressed interest in staying involved so Pittenger will recommend to the Regional Transportation Commission TRAFCC continue to meet quarterly through 2017.