ORANGE PARK – The town council moved money around in its budget to finally resurface of Bellair Road from Kingsley Avenue to Gano Avenue.

The Town of Orange Park has been steadily repaving and resurfacing roads over the years and on its list of roads last year was Bellair. This project was funded by the town’s Gas Tax, which took a hit last year as a result of COVID-19. Less people were driving so less people were paying for gas. The project was put on hold as a result.

“[We] now have funding from the CARES Act to continue resurfacing,” town manager Sarah Campbell said. “It was funded by the Gas Tax, which was down last year...but we’ve transferred CARES Act money for this.”

The town council voted Tuesday night, Feb.2, to amend their budget in a number of ways including increasing the general fund balance by $816,058 with the addition of CARES Act funding. The CARES Act is a federal funding act that sees money given to different counties to be used for projects affected by COVID-19, rent assistance, business assistance and more. The Clay County Board of County Commissioners have steadily received CARES Act money for months and part of that included doling out the money to related municipalities like Orange Park.

In order to pay for resurfacing of Bellair from Kingsley to Gano, the town council approved a budget amendment to the amount of a $75,000 decrease in the general fund balance to be transferred to the Gas Tax fund. It then approved a $75,000 decrease to the Gas Tax fund and transfer the money to the Street Departments budget.

Campbell said the resurfacing has already begun in the area so residents along Kingsley to Gano should notice construction crews out and about working on that.

In other business, the town council voted 5-0 to amend its standing rules. People with public comments on agenda items will be given five minutes to speak while those with public comments on non-agenda items will be given the usual three minutes. The town council members have traditionally been given as much time as they’d like at the end of the meeting to talk about essentially whatever they’d like to speak to, but these new standing rules limit each council member to five minutes during their time to speak at the end of a meeting.

The town council also approved the purchase of a Menzi Muck for $264,775. This machine is a “sole source excavator designed to work from the bottom of ditches to remove debris in small to large waterways without needing access to an embankment road easement for maintenance.”

The unit will replace the town’s current unit, which was purchased years ago for post-Hurricane Irma dredging but Campbell said it was purchased as used and ended up being a “lemon,” as it soon became clear the machine was not in as great as a condition originally thought. An essential piece of the machine broke and the town found its repair too expensive so it has sat out-of-service for close to a year.

The town is purchasing this new Menzi Muck machine to replace the broken one and continue projects related to dredging and ditch cleaning.