Flagstaff bond measure could bring infrastructure improvements
Flagstaff could get a nearly $58 million investment in city services such as wildfire suppression, stormwater flood mitigation, and wastewater treatment if a bond measure on the ballot this November passes.
Proposition 441 would fund these improvements to the city services through the city’s secondary property tax.
Flagstaff’s secondary property tax rate is not expected to increase as long as property values remain stable, according to the city.
The ballot measure will, in-part, fund the replacement of two fire engines and two water tenders that transport personnel, equipment and large amounts of water to fight fires.
Working with trucks that were more than 20 years old meant dealing with routine maintenance problems that often left equipment out of service in turn impacting response times, said Paul Oltrogge, Flagstaff’s Wildland Fire Manager.
The addition of new water tankers will also allow for firefighters to work to suppress a fire in an area where there might not be built-in infrastructure to supply water like a fire hydrant, he said.
“Just having that newer equipment that is more technologically sound and not much of a concern from a maintenance perspective just allows our personnel to be much more aggressive and tactical early and it’s going to keep them a lot safer too,” Oltrogge said.
Additionally, almost half of the money would be spent on projects totaling $26 million to triple stormwater capacity in the Spruce Wash watershed including channel improvements from Paradise to the Killip Retention Basin along with Route 66.
These improvements are primarily focused on areas impacted by the 2019 Museum Fire that have since seen numerous instances of post-wildfire flooding.
The purpose of this measure is to "put that money towards larger, more resilient infrastructure to reduce the flood risk into the future," said Edward Schenk, Flagstaff's Stormwater Manager.
Lastly, as Flagstaff’s population continues to grow, the city is also hoping to expand the water reclamation capacity through various projects paid for by the remaining $29 million in funds. To meet the needs of the growing community, the projects would install infrastructure upgrades, increasing capacity and improving energy efficiency.
"These investments will allow the City’s wastewater plants to continue to be able to serve a population of roughly 90,000 residents," said Flagstaff spokesperson Sarah Langley in an email statement.
The ballot measure would "also entail purchasing backup equipment to allow the wastewater plants to function in a power outage and purchasing equipment to allow for more efficient energy generation at the plant, as well as increasing the City’s capacity to process solids within wastewater," Langley said.
Contact northern Arizona reporter Lacey Latch at llatch@gannett.com or on social media @laceylatch. Coverage of northern Arizona on azcentral.com and in The Arizona Republic is funded by the nonprofit Report for America and a grant from the Vitalyst Health Foundation in association with The Arizona Republic.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Flagstaff could get infrastructure improvements with Proposition 441
