MONTROSE – Montrose City Councilors put their support behind a grant application to Great Outdoors Colorado that Montrose County will submit in an effort to update its fairgrounds master plan, said Mayor Thomas Smits.

Montrose County plans to submit the application in the fall grant cycle, and a letter of support from the city will be included in the packet.

Prior to the two entities’ decision, the county had considered withdrawing its support of the city’s efforts to obtain a GOCO grant for a whitewater park along the Uncompahgre River at Riverbottom Park in Montrose.

The city and Montrose Recreation District are working on an application to GOCO that could provide $350,000 toward the construction costs of a whitewater park (and corresponding park improvements). That pool of money, however, would come from a different GOCO program than the county's request. Therefore the two grants would not be competing, Smits said.

In an effort to show a more "shovel-ready" project, the city will include engineering plans in its GOCO application, which will probably be submitted for the spring grant cycle.

The county had originally voted to give $50,000 toward the project, if the city got the grant. But at a recent meeting, commissioners said they could provide the money for engineering costs, as the city had previously requested. Commissioners are expected to make their final decision during their regular meeting in early September.



CITY TO SEPARATE SANITATION AND RECYCLING CONTRACTS



Montrose city staff and councilors decided recently that it would be best to get the city's sanitation and transfer station contract secured, and continue to tweak its recycling efforts in a separate contract, according to city staff.

Cornerstone Waste and Recycling currently serves as the city's sanitation transfer station, but only on a month-to-month basis, as the city’s long-term contract with the company has expired.

The city had been trying to incorporate a recycling program within its sanitation department, and was constructing a contract that reflected both trash disposal and recycling efforts. However, it was decided during Aug. 22's city council work session that the trash transfer part of the contract was ready, and that staff should move forward with securing that contract, Municipal Services Director Jim Hougnon said.

The city continues to draft a recycling contract and still plans to have a single-stream, curbside recycling program in place by 2013, he said.

Earlier in August, councelors approved the purchase of the single-stream recycling bins, while on Monday Councilman Bob Nicholson was in Denver inquiring into material recovery centers (for recycling) that the city could use, Mayor Thomas Smits said.



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