Staff details riverfront capital projects, FEMA flood mitigation plan and six‑year CIP priorities

Clay, a city capital‑projects staff member, told the Improvement Commission at its July meeting that the city has completed several repairs to the freight house and outlined planned work across the riverfront and downtown. He said the freight house roof project is complete, the building’s fire alarm was replaced in the spring and a large window/steel/storefront repair will come before city council in August. "We have $330,000 set aside for masonry repairs to the freight house," Clay said, and he described a pending roughly $750,000 project to replace windows and repair the riverside storefront beam.

Why it matters: the work affects public facilities, tenant spaces and downtown access and ties into the city’s six‑year CIP and multiple external grants. Clay said one major mitigation effort — to reduce future flood damage at Union Station — could be funded in part by a FEMA mitigation grant of about $1,000,000, but the project has additional steps before construction can start.

Most urgent facts: Clay said bids and environmental reviews added time to the flood‑mitigation work. He described earlier subsurface testing that raised the possibility of contamination and costly remediation;…