March city council meeting briefly halts Jackson Plaza momentum
When it came time to discuss new business at Tuesday's Jackson City Council meeting, discrepancies in budget spending led to tabling the council's vote on the LRK Construction contract for the Jackson Plaza project until next month's meeting.
The finance department has only budgeted for the first task, according to city Planning Director Stan Pilant, and the council is expected to approve spending for each subsequent task.
Previously in December, the council met to approve the acquisition of the Jackson Plaza land for redevelopment, and during the February city council meeting, they approved a $122,800 redevelopment vision with LRK construction for the preliminary task of development.
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Councilmember Paul Taylor noted in this week's meeting that the additional funds included in the budget for "consulting fees" proved to be a more significant cost than what was budgeted for LRK's request for a property management service, the consulting fees in question were revealed to reflect the anticipated work by Tina Mercer of Infinite Consulting Group.
"That was the additional master planning that they were going to do in the larger area," Pilant said. "To look at the Old Hickory Mall area and do some analysis of that in terms of businesses that could be attracted and potential for other development in the area."
Taylor raised concern over not only the lack of budgeting done for the approximately $5,500 in consulting fees but asked whether the council is able to approve the project task by task.
Per the motion of Councilmember Johnny Dodd to table the agenda item "until we have more information," the council did not vote and the budget will be amended for the next meeting.
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“This is a comprehensive sub-area master plan which will go from Parkway to Heritage Apartments to Lynwood to Tinker Hill,” city Mayor Scott Conger said.
The confines of these parameters outline where traffic will be analyzed and a feasibility study will be conducted.
“There are multiple tasks in that and the way it’s going to lay out for the study will be over two fiscal years, and so we need to fund the first task this fiscal year and then we’ll budget for the next three tasks next fiscal year,” Conger said.
This article originally appeared on Jackson Sun: Jackson Plaza budgetary concerns halt votes at March council meeting.
