Greenway funds are tied up in state budget

Town Manager Bryan Edwards said town grants from the North Carolina Clean Water Management Trust Fund totaling $545,000 have been held up in the current state budget crisis.

"At this point and time, we just don't know when those funds might be released to us, there's been no information given on a timeline," he noted.

The funds being delayed are also hampering the town's ability to move forward with storm water management and work surrounding a proposed greenway and cleaning up the water in Bledsoe Creek.

The first grant, for $35,000, was a mini-grant for greenway planning that was awarded to the town late last year. "We were notified in December 2008 that we had been approved for those funds, but we haven't been able to draw them down. The contract documents have not been finalized."

Meanwhile, the second grant, for $200,000, was awarded to the town in January 2009. However, those funds are also in limbo at this point, Edwards said.

That grant was earmarked for the Bledsoe Creek Greenway project, which included funds for easements and land acquisition along the creek's path. "We really won't know how we are going to use these funds until the planning process progresses and it can't progress until we get those funds freed up," he said.

Meanwhile, Pilot View Resource Conservation District will administer another $310,000 grant for storm water management and best management practices related to storm water management across the entire town. However, Edwards said those funds also will focus primarily on helping clean up run off that is causing pollution in Bledsoe Creek.

"The water quality in Bledsoe Creek, based on studies conducted by the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources, appears to be declining," Edwards said. Problems with the creek's ability to support microorganisms that are the basis of the food chain have been seen over the past 15 years or so, Edwards noted. Sedimentation from development and pollutants entering the creek from storm water runoff are being blamed as the major contributors to the problems.

The creek, a total of five miles long from its headwaters to Little River, is currently a stocked trout stream throughout its path through the town. The headwaters of the creek begin off Bledsoe Creek Road.