Tuesday evening May 3rd at 6 PM during the Danville City Council meeting, discussion is scheduled from both the public and among Council members on the City Administration’s proposed plan for spending $24.7 million in ARPA COVID relief money. Judging by discussion during last week’s Public Services Committee meeting, there seems to be little disagreement among the Council thus far concerning the $13 million Garfield Park and Pool renovation plan.
Danville Fire Chief Don McMasters
But a lot of Council members want more than the $800,000 set aside for the purchase of a new fire truck. They are calling for the purchase of a much needed ladder fire truck, which could cost up to 1.5 million. So where would the money in the plan be moved over from? Mayor Rickey Williams, Jr says, probably from the infrastructure money dealing with bridge repair. The mayor is hoping that if that move is made, perhaps the rest of the bridge money can come from other sources.
AUDIO: There are a lot of federal funds coming through, so I hope that we’ll be able to receive either grant money or direct federal funding, as we have for some of the other programs from the infrastructure bill that was passed, to do that type of work. Currently we have just a little shy of $2 million set aside for bridges. So what we would do is likely use some money to buy the ladder truck and then use the rest of do bridge work.
,The plan is for discussion to happen tomorrow, and then a vote on the ARPA plan to happen during the May 17th City Council meeting. Mayor Williams says he looks for just some adjustments to the APRA plan and not a need for a rewrite, meaning the vote could take place as scheduled.
