The city’s BUILD grant application is part of an effort by city staff to throw jello at a wall. “Something is going to stick some time.”

If the project funding is awarded, the engineering alone would cost $2 million, though a grant may be available for that funding

“We’re trying. We’re looking,” City Manager Nancy Freenock said. “I keep throwing jello at the wall. Something is going to stick some time,”

And the BUILD grant application is worth the risk because she said all that it took to apply was “time and a little bit of money.”

The potential return on that investment is obvious.

Freenock said this funding isn’t needed for the hotel project to proceed “but it would make things a lot easier. (We) could get the whole area reconstructed and looking very nice.”

The grant awards, she said, will be announced on Sept. 20.

The roundabout at the intersection of Pennsylvania Ave. and Market St. was included in support of the application and she said now is an “opportune time” to complete all this work.

“It’s the time to focus on the riverfront,” she said. “The city hasn’t been able to capitalize the way other municipalities have. It’s time.”