Uptown facade project now just waiting on grant approval

The list of uptown buildings that are planning to participate in the city’s facade improvement project has been released by the Southern Iowa Council of Governments (SICOG).

SICOG Regional Planner Jeremy Rounds said this list is not definitive, and he expects at least one of the 13 program signees to drop out before all is said and done.

Rounds expects the total estimated cost for all the renovations will be around $790,000 in construction costs and $175,000 in miscellaneous costs.

Work done on the participating properties will range from simple paint jobs to constructing completely new storefronts, including new windows, doors and tuck-pointing. For some of the buildings with historic elements, restoration work may be done.

“It’s basically the first 2 feet back into the building,” Rounds said in a March 20 Creston City Council meeting. “So we’re not doing the roofs [and] we’re not doing interior renovations.”

Funding for the program depends on a Community Development Block Grant that the city recently applied for. Rounds is expecting to hear back on the grant award decision sometime in August.

On a property by property basis, about 50 percent of the repairs will be paid for by the grant, 25 percent by the property owner and 25 percent by the city.

During last Tuesday’s regular city council meeting, Rounds explained in it’s current state, the project is about $18,000 over budget, though he does not expect this to be much of an issue.

“So between now and the deadline,” Rounds said, “I will have to tweak that to get that down so the city match gets down to $250,000 and the grant [funding] gets down to $500,000. ... I’ll have to figure out a way to trim it out of the ‘soft’ costs. ... Those numbers always change anyway — because by the time the architect comes in and looks at the buildings more closely, all those things shift around quite a bit.”

In an email sent to the Creston News Advertiser, Rounds also added statements that:

1. Some owners with blighted buildings wanted to participate but could not meet certain program requirements at this time.

2. It is likely that Creston will pursue another round of grant funds in the next few years to work on more buildings in the uptown area, which may have a different target area boundary, if this program is successful and funding is available.