Councilman Wants Extra Cash to Go to Streets

Councilman Gary Monahan wants the City Council to use part of its cash reserves to pay for improvements to residential streets.

“This is excess money, and this is a way to give it back to the taxpayers,” he said at a special budget meeting this week.

In the past 12 months, the city’s reserve has grown from $14.13 million to about $14.5 million. Monahan said he hopes some of that money will be returned to the citizens in the form of better streets.

City Manager Allan L. Roeder said the city typically seeks grant money and local funding sources, such as Measure M funds, to pay for improvements to its roads and highways.

Roeder said the staff will study ways the city could spend some reserve money to beautify residential streets, however, and submit them to the council at its next meeting.