BY DAN HILDEBRAN
The Clay County Commissioner representing the Lake Region told her colleagues that residents of High Ridge Estates want better roads and are not concerned with access to water and sewer utilities.
Betsy Condon expressed frustration when the county’s grant department head recommended allocating some of a $20 million grant application with the federal government to water and sewer connectivity. She said the most urgent needs in the neighborhood east of Keystone Heights are road improvements.
“We’ve been working on the High Ridge Initiative for a year and a half, two years,” she said of a neighborhood improvement committee. “Every single meeting, a member of the neighborhood comes to the meeting and talks about the roads. That’s all they really care about.”
During their Sept. 24 board meeting, commissioners heeded Condon’s advice. They approved a grant application to the Environmental Protection Agency’s Community Change Grant Program, requesting $20 million to pave nearly nine miles of the neighborhood’s dirt roads.
