Carson City taking over South Carson St. discussed by board

The Board of Supervisors Thursday heard an update on plans for Carson City to take over a portion of South Carson Street from the Nevada Department of Transportation.

The transfer is being negotiated now between the city and NDOT in what is going to result in the fourth amendment to an agreement the two originally forged in 1997, said Patrick Pittenger, transportation manager.

The amendment transfers a stretch of South Carson Street to the city next year after the Carson Bypass is completed.

NDOT would do minor maintenance before the handover and provide $5 million to the city in lieu of resurfacing the street.

Those funds could only be used on South Carson between Fairview Drive and Snyder Avenue in a project to redo the road beginning in 2019.

Supervisor Lori Bagwell asked if the $5 million the city would receive from NDOT would cover the cost of the South Carson Street project. ”We know the validity of that number,” said Pittenger. “NDOT took the project to 90 percent of design, but they configured it for 45,000 a day and there are going to be far fewer cars.”

Carson City may narrow the road from three lanes in each direction to two due to the expected drop in traffic. A conceptual design is now in the works by the Regional Transportation Commission and funded by Carson Area Metropolitan Planning Organization.

The item was for discussion purposes only.

The board did take action on whether the city had sufficient funds to increase salaries for elected officers and the supervisors.

Nevada law establishes annual compensation for the district attorney, sheriff, clerk/recorder/public administrator, assessor, treasurer and supervisors, but the board must determine the city has the money to do it.

Supervisors Karen Abowd, Brad Bonkowski and Bagwell as well as Mayor Bob Crowell said they were opting not to take the raise while Supervisor Jim Shirk accepted it, but Shirk added, “I’ll not take it when every city officer (elected and city employees) declines it.”

John Barrette, during public comment, said while they all elected officials deserved a raise he hoped the board would decline to take it so the money could be spent on other things such as deferred maintenance.

The board also voted to allocate the Community Support Services Grant funding for 2017 as recommended by the Application Review Workgroup and Partnership Carson City.

They awarded $20,000 to United Latino Community, which serves the city’s Spanish-speaking population, to fund a client advocate position; $10,000 to Nevada Health Centers for its dental care program for low income children and adults; $12,000 to Ormsby Association of Carson City, which provides training and support to adults with developmental disabilities; $10,500 to the Salvation Army to provide rental assistance; $25,000 to Nevada Rural Counties RSVP, Inc., which provides services for seniors; $3,000 to the Dream Center, which does job training; $25,000 to Ron Wood Family Resource Center for operations; $19,400 to the Boys and Girls Clubs of Western Nevada for teen center programs; $6,500 to Carson City Symphony Association for its Strings in the Schools programs; $2,000 to the The Children’s Museum of Northern Nevada for science programs; $4,240 to the Capital City Circles Initiative for its youth program; and $2,000 to Partnership Carson City for grant management.

The board also passed on second reading a 1 percent hike to the occupancy tax to fund cultural tourism efforts.