VALLEY CITY, N.D. (NewsDakota.com) – The Valley City Commission approved of the first phase of the downtown Central Avenue improvement project known as Streetscape on a 4 to one vote on Tuesday, November 6th. City Commissioner Jeff Erickson voted against the motion.

Streetscape opponent Gary Schlagel was disgusted with the commission.

But Streetscape supporter Mary Lee Nielson said it will benefit the city.

Another opponent of the project Lloyd Nelson believes these businesses should pay for specials with the project.

Nelson is referring to a motion passed by the city commission accepting $35,000 from the Valley City Barnes County Development Corporation. The funding would be used to assist with the implementation of the Streetscape project through the city sales tax fund.

In October, the Strata Corporation had the lowest bid of $2.2 million which is $260,000 over the estimate of $1.9 million on the proposed project.

KLJ engineer Chad Peterson said construction on the project would start in June of 2019 after the Rally in the Valley event.