At Peachtree City’s last budget meeting a few weeks ago, City Councilman Eric Imker inquired about the details of how the city will spend its projected funds next year for golf cart path maintenance
At Peachtree City’s last budget meeting a few weeks ago, City Councilman Eric Imker inquired about the details of how the city will spend its projected funds next year for golf cart path maintenance.
Imker expects to get a full accounting at the July 8 budget meeting of which cart paths are targeted for repaving or other maintenance. He also wants a priority listing of new cart paths that the city has not yet constructed.
In an interview Wednesday, Imker said he might like to take some of the money for path maintenance and divert it to funding for construction of new paths.
“I want to understand if we’re doing too much maintenance and not doing enough additional cart paths where maybe two or three thousand people could use a new 500 or 1,000 feet of cart path,” Imker said.
Doing so might mean dropping one path off the repaving or significant maintenance list for the 2010-2011 budget year, but it might be worth it, Imker said.
Those decisions previously have been left up to the public works director and/or the city manager, but Imker thinks they should be decided by the City Council.
“I want to understand what’s being left off the list and why,” Imker said.
Staff in recent years have said the city has cut out funding for all new cart paths in an effort to save money, spending its cart path funds only on repaving and maintenance of existing paths.
“What we’re missing is the next cart path we need to build may cost $20,000,” Imker said, noting that it might require dropping off the maintenance on a path that is on the borderline in terms of whether it needs work or not. “
A group of Georgia Tech students is compiling some suggested path additions that would create shorter trips on the paths particularly to and from the city’s shopping centers in an effort to encourage more path use. Those students developed that concept as part of a study on how to improve the city’s village centers.
