update on bike lane funding within Montpelier's budget

[Montpelier Bikes]

Here's the Here's the update on bike lane funding within Montpelier's budget.

Mary Hooper reports that rather than put a specific dollar amount to
bike improvements next year, city council adopted a policy that calls
for sidewalks and bike ways to be addressed whenever the adjacent
roads are paved. The notion is that this will, over time, improve the
bike/ped opportunities. The policy also calls for spending an
additional $500,000 annually on CIP projects.

Additionally, Mary reports that the $ allocation to fund the entire
wish-list that's in the CIP budget would result in an "untenable" tax
increase, so things will need to be cut. So it is important for bike
ped advocates to be telling our leaders to fund these improvements.
Budget presentation is at the City Council meeting this Wednesday
December 7th, and there will be ongoing discussions about the budget
on the 14th & 21st of December, and 4th of January. Then there will
be two public hearings on the overall budget in January before it gets
finalized.

Getting in touch with your councilors and attending these meetings
will really help improve our cycling infrastructure.