published: Thursday, February 21, 2013

Council OK's block grant, funds for renovation

By SAMANTHA GHOLAR

sgholar@newssun.com

SEBRING - Council members discussed a handful of items during Tuesday night's regular meeting. A few items were unanimously passed by the council, including the Newsome Surgery Center party agreement and contract and the approval of the use of contingency funds to continue renovations at the Jack Stroup Civic Center.

The Community Development Block Grant will be used to construct a city-owned water and sewer line that will service the Newsome Eye Center upon development completion. The approval of the grant and project was contingent upon the new center guaranteeing an irrevocable letter of credit in advance to the city. Council member Andrew Fells' motion was passed without objection.

Public Works Director Kenneth Fields presented the council with updates regarding the current renovations at the Civic Center.

"We discovered asbestos underneath the tile in the Civic Center," Fields said.

After the discussion of the condition of the center's floor, Fields reminded the council that the center's renovation was budgeted at $40,000. Several renovations and improvements have already been completed at the site leaving approximately $19,000 in the budget fund. According to Fields, to complete the remaining renovations including the abatement and replacement of the tile in the 4,000-square-foot facility would cost an additional $10,000 to $15,000.

A suggestion by Mayor George Hensley was made to look at the city's infrastructure or contingency funds for the additional costs. City finance officials pulled the numbers and stated the each fund contained just approximately $100,000 of non-allocated funds.

Council member John Clark's motion to approve up to $15,000 for the balance of the Civic Center renovations from the contingency fund was unanimously approved by council.