Members of the Danville City Council are continuing their discussions on ways to fund storm water improvements. Some of the discussion during a committee meeting last evening (Tuesday) focused on possibly diverting money from demolition of sub-standard structures to storm water improvements.
‘’That’s problematic in my mind,’’ said Alderman Rickey Williams Jr., ‘’because we’ve said repeatedly that we want try to be very clear, and honest, and open and transparent with people about why we are creating fees, and where the money is going to go. You all have sold this to the public as we are going to demolish houses and get rid of blight in the community. And now we are looking at switching it to something else completely. And I don’t know that that works. I don’t know that people will get behind it,’’ added Williams.
Mayor Scott Eisenhauer reacted to a proposal to use half the $1.2 million dollars being generated from a tax for neighborhood revitalization for demolitions and the other half for storm water upgrades. ‘’My fear is that if you just simply split the baby down the middle there will be few dollars for actual storm water projects. Maintenance – yes, but not projects. And so we also don’t want to mislead the people that we’re going to be able to go out and do a bunch of projects with this where that certainly wouldn’t be the case.’’
City Council members are expected to continue their discussions next week.
