City looks to grant to upgrade Addy Street neighborhood

The city of Washougal hopes a Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) will help upgrade its Addy Street neighborhood. The City hopes to use the grant to improve sidewalks and and upgrade the stormwater system in the southeast Washougal neighborhood, along 35th Street from “A” to Addy streets. “Sidewalks are one of our strategically planned priorities that we’re trying to infill,” Washougal City Manager David Scott said during the Washougal City Council’s Nov. 18 workshop, referring to the City’s 2023-28 Strategic Plan. “We have sidewalk and stormwater infrastructure needs in the Addy neighborhood.” Scott showed photos that he said were a clear example of what the streets look like in that section of Washougal. “No sidewalks, stormwater issues,” he said, “so clearly, the need is there.” The City has estimated that the project will cost around $600,000 to complete, according to Scott. The maximum Community Development Block Grant, however, is typically $400,000, which is, Scott said, “not enough to do the whole project” so the City is considering doing the project in sections if it gets the CBDG money. “We’re looking at a phased approach, contingent on the grant, to try to pick off, piece by piece, some of the sidewalks in that area,” Scott said. The City plans to match the grant, which can only be used for lower-income qualifying areas, according to Scott, with $60,000 to complete a required environmental assessment that is not eligible to receive CDBG funds. “(The areas) have to meet income requirements,” Scott said. “The federal government categorizes census tracts, and we have two census tracts in our community that are eligible, and one is the Addy neighborhood. We’ve leveraged this program quite a bit for the Addy neighborhood, and so it makes sense to kind of continue to build on that work that this program has done for us there.” Councilwoman Molly Coston asked Scott during the Council’s Nov. 18 meeting if City leaders expect to hear any criticism from Addy Street residents about the project. “I know, historically, when we’ve done sidewalk projects, we have a lot of older neighborhoods that have no sidewalks at all, and because they’ve been without sidewalks or stormwater for so long, they’ve built right out into their right-of-way,” Coston said. “Sometimes these sidewalks do cause controversy when we want to put things in and tear out fences and landscaping and driveways that people have constructed.” Scott replied that he’s “not aware of a significant issue there, beyond the scenario of somebody having a tree (in their yard) or something like that.” Washougal City Councilman David Fritz asked Scott if the high-water table in the neighborhood would affect the urgency or increase the cost of the stormwater improvements. A high water table occurs when groundwater moves close to the surface, sometimes just above a crawl space or basement floor, after heavy rain or water from higher elevations drains into the soil around homes. “I haven’t been engaged with that particular issue,” Scott said. “I don’t know that we have to build a pond for this one where that might come into play, but we’ll have to work through that, because we’re going to have to figure out where to convey the water, right? Maybe it’s dry wells. How effective will they be? We will have to work through that. We’re basing our estimate on recent sidewalk construction along Evergreen and then added a bunch of contingency.” Scott said he expects the grant process to “be pretty competitive.” “We had to submit a pre-application,” he said. “Other cities have projects. We’ve got some (nonprofits) that are in for projects in our category. It’s always very competitive.”

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