Sandpoint commission puts City Beach boat launch, parking front and center in grant push

The Sandpoint Parks and Recreation Commission on Jan. 15 discussed submitting two grant applications to fund repairs and upgrades at City Beach and at the city RV park, and signaled staff should offer a larger local match for a state waterways grant while pursuing a paid-parking plan to support ongoing maintenance.

Commission member Jason, who led the discussion, said the Waterways Improvement Fund (WIF) application will put “the boat launch improvements front and center” and described the boat ramp as “really bad,” with “in some places, like, 3, 4 inch cracks where where it's collapsed.” He told commissioners the WIF request on the agenda is for $600,000 and the RV-park application is for about $1,000,000, and said both applications are due Jan. 31 with awards likely announced in May.

Jason said the immediate grant priorities are resurfacing the boat launch apron, improving the parking lot and upgrading lighting and stormwater treatment. He told the commission much of the work will require phasing over multiple years and estimated the full scope of City Beach upgrades could cost more than $1 million.

Commission discussion centered on how much local match to offer. The WIF program requires a local match; staff noted the minimum match is 5 percent. Jason described two possible approaches: offer the minimum match for the RV-park grant and increase the match for the WIF application to strengthen the application. He proposed a $50,000 match for the RV grant (5 percent of $1,000,000) and $100,000 toward the $600,000 WIF request and told the commission he planned to present those figures to the grants administrator in Boise. He described the commission’s response as implied consent rather than a formal vote, saying, “These decisions are staff decisions, but I just wanted them to get — we call it implied consent.”

Jason and other commissioners also discussed coordinating any new boat-launch fee with Bonner County and neighboring launches. Jason noted other local jurisdictions charge launch fees and that “boat launch fees for the city of Coeur d’Alene are generating over $100,000 a year” to maintain facilities. He warned that if Sandpoint were to charge for City Beach launching it should consider how charges would apply to other nearby sites to avoid shifting trailered-boat traffic into town.

Commissioners and staff also discussed a proposed paid-parking policy citywide. Jason cited the city’s parking study and projection models attached to the agenda, saying the proposal is intended to generate revenue to maintain off-street parking and to reduce all-day tourist parking that occupies City Beach stalls during peak season. He told the commission his model estimates City Beach could generate roughly $180,000 a year and that citywide paid parking could yield about $330,000 annually; he recommended that revenue collected at City Beach be reinvested there.

City staff repeatedly framed the grants strategy as a way to leverage limited parks capital-improvement funds — staff said the parks capital fund currently yields about $300,000 a year — and cautioned that any committed match funds would reduce the pool available for other smaller park projects listed in the city’s 2010 and 2020 parks master plans. Jason urged commissioners to review those plans and to provide feedback to staff prior to the grant deadline.

Staff reiterated the application timeline: draft applications are due Jan. 31 and applicants should expect a response from grant administrators in May. Jason asked commissioners to offer comments to staff over the next two weeks before final submission.

No formal motion or roll-call vote on the grant matches or the paid-parking policy was recorded at the Jan. 15 meeting; staff described the commission’s guidance as implied consent to move forward with a higher match for the WIF application and a minimum match for the RV grant.