By T. Scott Boatright
GRAMBLING — Water project funding was the primary order of attention Thursday evening as the Grambling City Council held its monthly meeting for February.
That included the City Council authorizing a change order for a Water Sector Project involving replacement of city water meters. The change order comes after the Council voted in December to redistribute surplus funding from another project.
“This should bring us to as built conditions,” Shuler said of the need to make the change order. “Contractually on paper we’re done, but they have more work to do in the field. Probably 40-45 days and we’ll be ‘done done.’ All in all, I’m tickled because we’re about $220,000 under budget.
“Here’s what that means. The Water Sector Program won’t allow us to use that for something completely unrelated. Half of that, around $100,000, was from (the city’s) ARPA funds and has been redistributed as was voted on during your December meeting to keep work on (replacing city) water meters going. This change order will make that happen.”
The American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) is a $1.9 trillion federal stimulus bill that was signed into law by President Biden on March 11, 2021. The ARPA was intended to help the country recover from the COVID-19 pandemic by providing economic and public health assistance.
Grambling’s City Council also authorized Mayor Alvin Bradley to sign all documents required to make 2024-25 LGAP (Local Government Assistance Program) and CWEF (Community Water Enrichment Fund) applications.
“LGAP is Local Government Assistance Program that comes from the state every year,” Shuler said. “You’re eligible for up to $50,000, and you usually get at least close to that. This application will be for street repairs. It will probably be just isolated patches.
“CWEF stands for Community Water Enrichment Fund. The most popular need right now is water meters, so we’ll seek up to $50,000 to change out more water meters. I believe we’re doing about 800 of them in the current project so we still have several hundred to go to finish all of it. This is what the money would go toward.”
Shuler also advised Grambling’s City Council to authorize Bradley to sign a contract with the Mabry Company for a need he deemed urgent.
“We have kind of a couple of emergency situations that if we don’t fix them now could get out of hand,” Shuler said. “Probably the most urgent one is on Stadium Drive where we’ve had a caved-in culvert. The city has made a couple of temporary patches.
“What that authorization would do is allow the Mabry Company to repair that one and another one on Park Street. We have amended another LAGAP grant to fund those repairs, so that won’t come directly out of city funds.”
Shuler then warned the Council he said they need to keep their eyes on.
“The Trump Administration had their federal funding freeze,” Shuler said. “(Grambling Mayor Alvin) Bradley called and asked if that would affect us. My answer was no, because any Federal funds we have coming are already approved.
“But then it was clarified a little later than even though there might already be money in state coffers, (the federal government) could freeze those accounts. I didn’t know that. So the point I’m making is that about $900,000 of your current water projects come from federal funds that have not been released yet. You draw the money as projects are completed.”
Shuler told the council that one state agency yesterday decided to delay the start of an approved project because of the current uncertainty about federal funding of projects.
“There’s a lot of uncertainty that’s above my pay grade and above y’all,” Shuler said. “So let’s just pray that gets worked out because it could impact the city. I’ve been told they wouldn’t be able to process your payouts for federally-funded projects if, for some reason, that freeze is there.
“It doesn’t make me feel good because a lot of our projects, even beyond y’all, are federally funded. We’ve gotten emails from the state encouraging that we should try to draw the funds as quickly as possible because of fears the freeze could hinder projects.”
