City to do $30,000 in downtown improvements
By Ethan Smith
Published in News on January 24, 2016 1:45 AM
The Goldsboro City Council allocated nearly $30,000 toward further improving the downtown area at its meeting Tuesday night.
Goldsboro will host the North Carolina Main Street Conference from March 16 to March 18, and will be doing work on several parking lots, light poles and other areas downtown to get the downtown fully up to par before the conference.
Upon learning in February 2015 that Goldsboro would host the conference, the city was told to expect the cost of hosting the conference to be at least $10,000. This amount was allocated in the city's general fund budget for this fiscal year.
The Downtown Goldsboro Development Corporation held two fundraising events during the past six months, raising roughly half of the $10,000 it costs to host the conference.
Therefore, funding the rest of the cost relied on the City Council allocating funds to cover the costs.
Going into Tuesday night's meeting, the council was asked to authorize nearly $55,000 that would go towards hosting and making downtown improvements for the conference.
"Every year we do a budget, just like in my household and most other households of the citizens of Goldsboro. We have to live within that budget," said District 6 council member Gene Aycock. "I know when unexpected things come up, sometimes we have to make sacrifices or we have to find the money from elsewhere. But going to the general fund is not always the answer. It's not a bucket that there's no bottom to -- there's a bottom to it. And we've got to start living within our budget. While I understand this main street conference, from what I read, would cost at least $10,000, and now we're looking at $60,000. I made the statement years ago, I'd love to drive a Cadillac, but I can't afford to buy one. Well, I could, but it would hurt my budget in other areas. We're going to have to start determining what we want to spend money on and what we need to spend money on, and we haven't come to that point yet."
After much discussion between the members of the City Council, $26,759 from the Municipal Service District Fund was authorized for the event.
MSD funds are accrued by collecting taxes from people that live within a nine block area of downtown, which was levied on citizens in that area in 1979. The MSD is loosely outlined by Ash Street, William Street, George Street and Spruce Street, with the district lines jutting in and out of various blocks on those streets.
The MSD tax is 23.5 cents per every $100, on top of city and county taxes residents in the district also pay.
The following items were approved for funding by the Goldsboro City Council:
* Window coverings for Union Station windows -- $3,200
* Improvements to the former J.C. Penney parking lot --$4,000
* Improvements to the John Street parking lot -- $3,500
* Beautification of the historic Gidden Clock on Center Street, with no mechanical improvements being made - up to $3,000
* Painting all light poles in the downtown area - up to $8,450
* Funding the remainder of the $10,000 cost to host the conference - $4,609
The two most expensive items requested, the funding for which would have come from the city's general fund, were not funded by the council Tuesday night. Those items were requests to plant seasonal plants throughout the downtown area at a cost of $9,500, and a request to hang 108 banners throughout the downtown area at a cost of $11,024.
The banners would have been hanged on the light poles along the side of Walnut Street that lead toward Union Station.
Seasonal plantings are still expected to happen some time in the near future before the conference comes, but the council deferred taking action on the matter Tuesday night.