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A section of Welts Street in Mount Clemens. The portion of the road between northbound and southbound Gratiot Avenue is being repaired, with nearly 82% of the cost being covered with federal funds.
Photo by Erin Sanchez
MOUNT CLEMENS — The Mount Clemens City Commission had a light and quick meeting on Feb. 21, tackling two separate monetary items in under 20 minutes.
First up was the allocation of the 2023 Community Development Block Grant funds. While five organizations came out on Feb. 6 to speak about why they should receive a cut of the city’s $13,700 in CDBG funds, the total amount was split between only two. An allocation of $8,100 was put toward the city’s senior center for activities, which was more than the $6,200 the Mount Clemens Recreation Department asked for earlier in February. Advancing Macomb received $5,600 — the exact amount it requested at the Feb. 6 meeting — to support the Breaking Barriers to Play initiative, which provides youth recreation programs at the Cairns Community Center.
The city also requested a $150,000 grant from the CDBG program to pay for a play structure at the Cairns Community Center. The city is unlikely to receive this grant, however, after receiving one in 2022.
“I think it’s great that we came up with the community play structure at Cairns for the 150 ($150,000),” City Commissioner Laura Fournier said. “I know we struggled last year to come up with what the projects could be, so very good.”
The allocations must be spent by Dec. 31, 2024.
MDOT agreement
Commissioners also approved an agreement with the Michigan Department of Transportation to share costs on repairs to Welts Street between northbound and southbound Gratiot Avenue. The total repair cost will be $286,000, with federal surface transportation funds covering $234,091 (about 82% of the costs), and $53,546 coming from the city’s major streets fund.
Fournier raised a question about how the city was able to use federal funds for a local street, and Public Services Director Jeffrey Wood explained that the section between the two sides of Gratiot Avenue is eligible for federal funding because of its National Functional Classification.
“The other section that runs from Canfield (Drive) all the way to Gratiot, that is not part of that National Functional Classification,” Wood said. “Anybody that uses (Welts Street in downtown Mount Clemens) should know that it’s a nightmare as well. We’re putting a lot of patch there.”
Fournier asked about adding a full repair of Welts Street from Canfield Drive to Gratiot to the upcoming budget, though it would require examining the available funds and determining Welts’ pavement surface evaluation and rating score.
