Springfield’s City Council Monday received an update on the Neighborhood Works+ program.
The program funded by a $5 million allocation from the city’s Spring Forward SGF sales tax revenue has been described by the city as an attempt to work with registered neighborhoods and the city’s Neighborhood Advisory Council and Citizen’s Advisory Board to develop neighborhood improvements.
Dane Seiler, with Traffic Engineering Consultants Inc. has been working with city staff to collect public input and finalize a plan for the program’s first year. Seiler said they started last December, collecting over 560 project ideas through public engagement, they narrowed that to around 160 projects that they estimate would take $72.2 million to fund. About 5% of those projects will be funded with the $5 million available to the program in its first year. Seiler said they include projects in 22 of 24 registered neighborhoods.
According to Monday’s presentation, the recommended projects for round one of Neighborhood Works+ are largely made up of sidewalk and traffic calming projects as well as quality of place work with some stormwater improvements.
Seiler said the next step is to take their list of potential first year projects back to the Citizen’s Advisory Board.
“We're going to take it to Cab. And then ultimately, it would come back before City Council for final approval. So, you guys will see this again in the form of ordinance at some point.”