CLAREMONT — The City Council has taken the first step toward placing a special assessment on Washington Street properties to pay for a majority of the estimated $1.2 million cost to repave the city’s main commercial strip.

The council, at its meeting last Wednesday, set a date of June 19 for a public hearing at the community center to give the businesses and homeowners the opportunity to ask questions and express their support or opposition to the proposed assessment.

This is the first such proposal put forward by City Manager YoshiManale under a city ordinance that was amended last year by the council. The paving project of the four-lane road would be 2.3 miles from the Puksta Bridge east to the intersection with Old Newport Road.

“It is important we move forward on this,” Assistant Mayor Deb Matteau said during the council discussion. “This step isn’t saying that we are going to do it. This step is to get the ball rolling and get the notices out. We have the data and we have the bid, and we know the approximate cost to each user.”

In the coming weeks, the city will have a legal review of the proposal and also calculate what each property owner will be assessed based on data from a traffic study. Letters to the property owners will explain the assessment for each property, how it was calculated and how much the owner would be required to pay if the council gives final approval. Then, the council is expected to decide whether to approve the special assessment.

Last October, the council voted to amend a 1977 city ordinance to allow a special assessment for infrastructure projects. Instead of requiring a petition from the city manager signed by at least half of the affected property owners, the amendment allows the city manager to propose a special assessment without support from property owners.

Councilors said at the time it would be a good tool to help the city make faster progress improving its streets and roads, the condition of which is a constant source of complaints from residents.

According to state law, properties in special assessment districts can be apportioned based on several criteria including “square footage, front-footage, increased value, traffic generation, or other impact generation factors, or any combination thereof.”

The $1.2 million bid is valid until July 1, 2025, Department of Public Works Director Alex Gleeson told the council. The city anticipates using money generated by the assessments to pay for a little more than 75% of the project, or about $930,000, Manale said.

At last week’s council meeting, Austin Ford, a GIS analyst/data manager for the Upper Valley Lake Sunapee Regional Planning Commission, presented data collected during a 12-month traffic study on Washington Street from June 2022 to May 2023. The study, which used software called Street Lights, found that about 30,000 vehicles travel Washington Street each day, Ford said.

The data was based on trip counts and officials were still working to determine how many vehicles use the street to enter one of about 61 driveways to various businesses, Ford said.

A preliminary analysis has been completed, Ford said, and they will refine the data to arrive at a percentage for each property owner. That information will then be provided to the city for the letters that will be sent out to property owners with their assessment.

Manale told the council that it is critical the driving data be accurate.

“We want to be sure whatever data we use, we could stand behind,” he said.

Matteau also said with the recent property revaluation which shifted some of the tax burden from commercial to residential properties, the Washington Street property owners may still break even from what they were paying in taxes two years ago.

“I think this is a prudent way to get something done that needs to be done as fair as possible to the whole community,” Matteau said.

Patrick O’Grady can be reached at pogclmt@gmail.com.