Santa Ana : $10 Million Asked to Fix Sidewalks and Streets

Increased expenditures for long-neglected sidewalks, alleys, curbs, gutters and roadway medians are at the top of City Manager David N. Ream’s wish list for the next fiscal year and beyond.

While the City Council’s deliberations on the 1987-88 budget will probably not begin until next month, Ream and some of his staff outlined parts of their proposed budget at an informal study session on Monday.

“Our public facilities and public infrastructure are not up to the standards of quality of communities in other parts of the county,” Ream said. “Our goal is to eliminate all deferred maintenance over the next five years.”

Ream proposes to spend about $10 million over the next five years on sidewalks, curbs and gutters--items that have been budgeted for about $100,000 annually since 1982. About $1.5 million would be spent annually on medians and $1.2 million on alley resurfacing, far more money than has been budgeted for those projects in recent years.

The city’s alleys are in particularly bad shape, Ream said, and it would probably take 20 years to repair them all.

Ream also proposed that more than $1 million be budgeted to begin plans for a new maintenance yard and new buildings to house the Police and Fire departments.

A formal budget proposal will probably be made to the City Council at the end of May, he said.