Over the past two months, the Fremont County Commissioners have been dealing with the State of Colorado trying to get our Fremont County businesses back open, as well as spending many hours on a few recent projects.
In December of 2019, we were awarded a Department of Local Affairs (DOLA) Energy and Mineral Impact Grant for $1 million to construct a community center at Pathfinder Park. The DOLA grant, combined with about $600,000 from the 4-H Foundation and approximately $917,000 from in-kind work and Conservation Trust Funds, will provide our community with a much needed community center which will provide an updated and spacious facility to begin moving the Fremont County Fair to Pathfinder Park as well as a location for other community events. It’s worth noting that we have received some verbal commitments from local companies to help with the in-kind work for the Pathfinder Project. We expect design work for the building to be completed by the end of June.
One of the goals of the Commissioners when I took office in January of 2013, was to find a permanent home for the Fremont County Search & Rescue (SAR). They have been housed at the Sheriff’s office, and have outgrown the space available. The old Atmos buildings on East Main Street recently became available, and our offer of $425,000 was accepted. These funds will come from the Sales & Use Tax Fund, which is a voter approved fund for capital expenses, and this type of project would work well for those funds. We are currently in Phase Two of an environmental assessment to determine if there are any environmental hazards on the property, and Stantec Inc. is working on finalizing the reports. We should have results by next week and are scheduled to close by the middle of June. We are hopeful to move forward with relocating our SAR group and a few other county services to a bigger location.
And lastly, Canon City Councilman Jim Meisner and I have met twice within the past month with the Oil Creek Ditch Board of Directors to come up with a plan for the new storm drain intersecting the Oil Creek ditch on Rhoades Avenue. Our last meeting with them included Atkins Engineering, and I believe we can come up with a solution to benefit all the entities involved. This storm water project is a combined effort with the City of Canon City and Fremont County is contributing $200,000 of Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILT) funds towards this project, which runs just north of East Main Street down the west side of Rhoades Avenue. I believe this will be money well spent, as the flood of September of 2015 through this area severely impacted not only Rhoades Avenue and businesses along East Main, but the Sherrelwood and Cranberry Park subdivisions as well.
While the bulk of our time is spent on working on variances to present to the State of Colorado due to Covid-19, we are still working on a plethora of projects, both large and small for the citizens of Fremont County.
Tim Payne,
Fremont County Commissioner, District One.