Sneak Peek: Tacoma City Council This Week

Budget

The big item on this week’s City Council study session is the January 2012 budget review. We’ve seen cuts, lost positions, increased fees, decreased exemptions, and general belt-tightening around the City, and we’ve come a long ways towards closing the $30-something-ish million budget gap, but we’re not done yet. This week’s report will give us another data point as we re-assess, yet again, where the City’s budget stands.

It’s honestly looking pretty dull again this week; we’re guessing you don’t give a hoot about most of the agenda items, so we’re going to do ourselves a favor and turn in early… What? You’re still there? Oh all right. Here goes…

Water

A few water-related items show up on this week’s agenda. Two resolutions propose that the City accept loans from the EPA’s Drinking Water State Revolving Fund program, and turn those loans into low-interest loans to the Washington State Public Works Board for the McMillin Reservoir Replacement Project and the Green River Filtration Facility Project. And a purchase resolution awards a contract for “improvements to the Central Treatment Plant’s High Purity Oxygen Generation Facility” (we don’t really know what that is, but it does sound like a good thing). The other purchase resolution item awards funds for operating and maintenance of the Hylebos Bridge.

Public Hearing

This Tuesday is the date set for a public hearing by the City Council on the proposed conveyance of 12,511 square feet of property located within Tacoma Rail Mountain Division railroad right-of-way at Blakeslee Junction, north of Centralia, to the Washington State Department of Transportation.

Easement

In the “money in” category we see a resolution authorizing the conveyance of a “subterranean easement” for the amount of $4,000, for a small piece of land adjacent to McKinley Park to widen I-5, including an HOV lane.

The piece of in question for the easement.