Mayor Sharetta Smith spoke at the Lima Building and Construction Trades luncheon Thursday morning, highlighting projects and honoring their contributions.
Precious Grundy | The Lima News
LIMA — Several projects are underway in the city of Lima. The Lima Building and Construction Trades hosted its annual Christmas celebration on Thursday morning. Mayor Sharetta Smith spoke as the guest of honor highlighting various projects and thanking community members for their help and support.
“The streetscape improvements that you all are seeing in the 100 block of Spring Street is just the first of three phases to the streetscape in the core of our downtown,” Smith said. “We anticipate for it to be complete by February of 2024. Phase two will be Central Avenue, which is currently in the detailed design phase — we anticipate construction in the second half of 2024 and the first half of 2025.”
Smith also shared updates on projects including the Schoonover Observatory, Cable Road, Floating Solar Panels at Twin Lakes Reservoir and improvements to street lighting. The Lima Aquatic Center will soon enter into construction. Smith said the project could potentially be completed in the beginning of 2025.
“The Lima community Aquatic Center consists of a multi-use pool with an all-season enclosure, an outdoor activity pool and a pool house,” Smith said. “There has been a lot of conversation around operating costs and I am happy to say that we have received contributions from community partners that will ensure that the operating costs of the pool are paid for at least until 2028 — that allows us time to work with an endowment consultant to raise a projected amount of funds to have an evergreen endowment to pay for the operation of the pool.”
The organization also acknowledged its members and shared its contributions to the community and its impact.
“Our success stretches the entire community,” President Brad Wendel said. “We set the standard for wages, benefits and safety in the industry. We are also proud to have invested $80 million in training our members. They have all gone to various apprenticeship programs to keep abreast of the changing technology and procedures and for continuing education classes. Our workers are the best trained and the safest workers you can hire. In the past year, the trades have changed over 300 lives.”
Reach Precious Grundy at 567-242-0351.
