City to advertise for bids soon

The next step in the development of the city’s riverfront property may begin this fall, Mayor Rich Blankenship said.

The city will advertise for bids for the remediation of the property beginning Sept. 25, the mayor said. Blankenship said he encourages local contractors to submit a bid for the project.

“We want the project to begin this fall,” Blankenship said.

The remediation will take about one year, the mayor said. Workers will remove between 4 and 5 feet of soil and put in clean fill, he said.

In June, the city was awarded $1.5 million in Clean Ohio funds from the Department of Development for the remediation of the two pieces of property, one known as the Brammer parcel, which is owned by the Ironton Port Authority, and the other Wharf parcel, which the city owns. The properties are between undeveloped riverbank to the north and The Fuzzy Duck restaurant to the south.

The remediation is the second phase in the project, which began with a historical background of the property.

The city plans to apply for funding from the Boating Infrastructure Grant Program, which is run by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.

The grant program is geared toward the construction of transient moorage facilities for non-trailerable boats that are more than 26 feet long. The grant would pay for transient boat decks, seawalls, and restroom facilities and lighting for transient boats, said Phil Miller of ODNR.

The city has also applied for a $100,000 ODNR Nature Works grant for the construction of biking and walking trails on the riverfront property. That grant will be awarded Sept. 26.

“There’s a lot of steps you have to go through to get this,” Blankenship said of developing the city’s riverfront property. “We’re very fortunate to get these grants because otherwise we would not be able to do this.”