CLEVELAND, Tenn. — The baseball fields at the county recreation park on Urbane Road may get $235,000 worth of new lights.
Members of the Bradley County Finance Committee voted Wednesday to recommend approval by the full commission of a 15-year agreement with monthly payments to Cleveland Utilities.
The utility would add a monthly maintenance charge totaling $21,000 over the life of the agreement. But the county has the power to buy the lighting equipment, keep the manufacturer’s 25-year warranty and assume maintenance cost at any time.
“If we pay it off — in other words, buy it — the maintenance cost would be ours,” County Mayor D. Gary Davis told the committee.
But he and Parks and Recreation Director Paul Wyrick said the same lighting equipment at another county park has had no maintenance cost for several years.
Finance Committee members agreed the county should revisit the project during the new budget cycle. It would cost about $200,000 to buy the equipment in the next three or four months, members estimated.
The county has made a separate lighting arrangement with Volunteer Energy Cooperative for ballfields at Charleston.
Preparation for the new fiscal year begins shortly. Mr. Davis gave a timetable to commissioners Monday setting the first step, a meeting of department heads, on March 10.
The timetable calls for a vote on a 2010-11 budget July 6.