News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
Jamestown is taking the next step in applying for a $250,000 dollar multimodal sidewalk grant for downtown.
Jamestown Mayor Lyndon Baines said he will take a resolution to the city council on Monday in order to submit the long form application. Baines said he believes the city council is behind this effort and is confident the city’s application will be accepted.
“We’ve got our foot in the door and we’re eligible now for the big long form,” Baines said. “Usually when you do the long form, usually you got your foot in the door and you’re probably gonna get the grant and its a 95/5, we only have to pay 5 percent of that so that’s pretty good for us.”
Baines said this is a priority because of feedback from handicap residents seeking independence to get where they need to go. He said that can be residents needing access to food, medicine or a trip downtown.
“We have a lot of residents in Jamestown that are in power chairs, wheel chairs or walkers,” Baines said. “We do have some sidewalks but they’re not handicap accessible, not all of them, so what I’m looking at is trying to make it more accessible for them to use power chairs, make it a little wider so that way they can be more independent.”
Baines said the city needs to put together an engineer’s report to go along with Jamestown’s form. Baines said this will hopefully answer any questions the state might have.
“When you go with the long form they want more details like, ‘hey, what are you going to do with this, where are you going to do that?'” Baines said. “We have to have the engineer look at it and make us out a form.”
Baines said he expects the grant process to wrap up in early 2021. Multimodal Access Grants are a TDOT state-funded program.
