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07/27/09
Special council meeting on Town Center intersection set for Aug. 26
The Town Council will hold a special meeting on the Town Center intersection traffic light proposal on Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2009, 7:30 p.m. in the Town Hall chamber.
Jim Rowe, Town Council chairman, said at the July regular meeting of the council that he expected the council to be ready to decide on whether the town would accept or reject a grant from the Portland Area Comprehensive Transportation Committee to help fund full signalization and site improvements to the intersection located at Scott Dyer, Shore and Ocean House roads.
The council had put off a decision until November, but officials from PACTS and the Maine Department of Transportation have asked for a decision sooner.
The town was awarded in state and federal funds for the project in 2004, which would have paid for 85 percent of the project. Pending various delays, however, the cost of design and construction has risen to just under $1.1 million at last estimate, leaving a local share of $716,500.
Town Manager Michael McGovern, in a memo to the council dated July 16, 2009, said that if the town does accept the funding and puts the project out to bid, $430,926 of a $2.4 million bond issued in 2008 for capital improvements is potentially available. There is also, as of June 30, 2009, $109,425 available in the town's infrastructure improvement fund, established in 2007 to pay for municipal infrastructure. The fund is funded by a portion of building permit fees.
The total the town may have available for the project, including the PACTS allocation, is $903,851 - 83.6 percent, but $176,149 short, of the most recent estimated cost.
If the council votes to decline the funds, the town will owe $25,000 to MDOT for the local share of expenses to date.
If the council were to authorize final design and bidding for the project, but later decided not to move ahead with the project, the town would be responsible for the $25,000 in expenses plus 100 percent of the cost of final design and bidding, estimated at $80,000-$100,000.
Rowe, at the July council meeting, said the town's financial obligations to the state if the grant is rejected, as well as the amount of bond money available for the project, were two most pressing questions that needed to be answered before the council could make a decision.
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