The Port Orchard City Council Tuesday night unanimously approved the application for the public event called “Paint the Town,” which is designed to freshen up buildings along Bay Street before the Cedar Cove Days festival.
“Let’s get ’er done,” said Councilman Jim Colebank as the motion for approval was made, but Public Works Director Mark Dorsey said that there was still the small matter of whether the city had permission to close Bay Street to cars while the volunteers are painting buildings.
“I don’t want to be a wet blanket, but there is a chance the state could say, ‘No, you can’t close the road,’” Dorsey told the council.
Organizers hope to close Bay Street between Harrison and Frederick avenues, which is officially State-Route 166.
Port Orchard Police Chief Al Townsend said that the state does approve other requests to close the road, such as during the annual Cruz Classic Car show in August, but they are usually submitted months in advance.
“If they do allow us to close it, I am suggesting it be barricaded in such a way that does not require officers to direct traffic,” Townsend said, explaining that if officers were required to direct traffic, it would cost the city $3,000 in overtime wages.
“I think it is worth the officers’ time to pull this off,” said Councilman John Clauson, adding that he would be “shocked” if the state didn’t approve closing the road.
Councilman Fred Olin asked if it was possible to paint without closing the road, but Mayor Lary Coppola said he felt it would be “too dangerous.”
Olin also asked how the crews, if they would be “pressure-washing” the old paint off the buildings, planned to ensure paint chips and other residue did not drain into the sound, and Dorsey said as long as filters, or “socks,” were placed on the drains to prevent toxic materials from reaching the water.
• Also at the meeting, the council unanimously approved allowing Port Orchard Library branch manager Kathleen Wilson to hire Rodney Ewing to repair the mural on the west side of the library’s building.
When Councilman Jerry Childs asked how long it would take to complete the work, Ewing said it was a delicate process, since the chipping paint has to be removed from the concrete very carefully to ensure that the wall material doesn’t “fall right off.”
Ewing said his goal was to make sure the mural looked “even” when he was done, and no parts of it looked considerably newer than the others.
Members of the council expressed concern that the mural be completed prior to Cedar Cove Days, and Colebank said “he assured me that it would.”
Ewing will be paid “not more than” $800 for the work.
• The council also unanimously approved paying Kitsap Harbor Tours $1,900 to provide foot-ferry service between Port Orchard and Bremerton on five Sundays: June 28, Aug. 9, Aug. 30, Sept. 6 and Sept. 13.
City Clerk Patti Kirkpatrick explained that Port Orchard is actually only paying one-third of the operations costs, and the other two-thirds will be paid by the city of Bremerton and the Port of Bremerton. Kirkpatrick said a similar deal was struck in May for the Kitsap Harbor Festival.
Councilman Fred Chang said he was in favor of this resolution, and said on a recent Sunday morning he encountered a group of people that were “surprised to find that the foot ferry was not running,” and had to find an alternate way to get to Bremerton.
