City Manager Julie Oakley presented a list of expenses that previously had been approved that the grant money would be eligible to cover. Some of the items were the Voyent Alert system, an emergency management vehicle, a handheld radio for the city's emergency manager, an automatic door replacement at the activity center, water retention ponds at city hall, cleaning out the activity center and a floor cleaning machine for the police station.
Oakley said all of those items cost about $124,650. There is about $1.9 million in the fund, with the next half of funds arriving in August, bringing the total of grant funds received to about $3.56 million.
Oakley said she hopes funds will be able to be used for city parks, since Lakeway’s parks suffered a lot of wear and tear during the pandemic. She said she is waiting on clarification from the U.S. Treasury on what exactly the funds can be used for.
She also said it is important to find projects to use the funds for, because if the city does not use the money, they will need to pay it back.
Council Member Gretchen Vance said she would like to see a senior citizen fitness playground.
Oakley cautioned against using the funds on ongoing expenses, since it would make payments harder once the extra funds were gone.
