PEEKSKILL The citys sidewalk repair program will soon be offered to residents, but with a few significant changes since its proposal last year.
The program was reviewed after Peekskills attorneys recommended taking a second look. Officials had to change the wage structure of the project, significantly limiting how many residents could be helped.
We anticipate we can do about 100 houses in the city based on the average length of sidewalk in the city at the average home, said City Manager Rick Finn at Tuesdays Common Council work session.
The city will now offer the program to one and two-family owner-occupied properties and only to families with owner family incomes not exceeding 80 percent of the area median income.
A HUD income chart can be found here to help determine who qualifies.
The program is being funded by money already available to the city, Finn said.
We have $200,000 from the last two years corporate budgets and were going to take an additional $200,000 out of community development block grant money that we had, Finn said.
All residents who qualify are allowed to apply for the funding and if there are more applicants than funds available a lottery will be set up to randomly select applicants. While there is no way to know how exactly many city residents actually fit the requirements, Corporation Counsel Bernis Nelson said senior citizens on the enhanced STAR program would qualify easily.
The city will seek the lowest priced responsible bidder to handle the paving on behalf of the city for the program. The common council is expected to approve the sidewalk program at its meeting Monday and will begin advertising to residents soon afterwards.
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