Evans City officials are planning multiple stormwater projects aimed at stabilizing aging infrastructure throughout the borough.

However, for a municipality with a limited tax base, funding has become one of the main roadblocks in that mission.

Officials received positive news last week when the state announced $300,000 in Local Share Account funding. The money will help replace the West Main Street culvert, one of the main projects requiring attention.

The borough originally sought about $750,000 for the project. Council President Cheri Deener said the funding will allow the borough to plan for the nature of the work while it pursues additional funding.

“We’re going to try to go back in future grant rounds and add to it,” she said. “This will give us a base to start, especially for the engineering costs and figuring out exactly what needs done.”

The culvert, located along a heavily traveled stretch of West Main Street, runs adjacent to a creek and has been steadily eroding the ground beneath the road.

Deener said the concern is not flooding, but rather the possibility of a total collapse and the resulting safety hazard.

“There is nothing there to really hold the road up,” she said. “If that goes, we’ve got a major, major issue.”

The borough has already conducted preliminary inspections. Drone footage taken inside the culvert revealed substantial deterioration.

While engineers will require more detailed studies, Deener said the borough now has enough funding to begin engineering work in earnest.

The culvert also lies along a state road, which has raised previous questions about responsibility. Deener said the borough has pushed for action but has often been turned down for immediate help.

“The only way it gets fixed sometimes is when it becomes an emergency,” she said.

According to the grant application submitted to the state in coordination with Cranberry-based engineering firm Herbert, Rowland & Grubic, design work for the project began in October.

That same application anticipates project completion in October 2027.

Along with the West Main Street culvert, the borough is also preparing for work on the Harrison Street Bridge. That project is expected to begin in the spring.

The bridge, which carries mostly local traffic, will require replacement of failing structural supports beneath the deck, Deener said. “It’s not the top of the bridge, but instead, it’s what holds it up. Those supports are all falling apart.”

The bridge project, she said, is expected to cost between $400,000 and $500,000. Funding comes through a combination of grants and low-interest infrastructure bank financing, with assistance from Butler County to reduce costs.

A third priority project involves stormwater improvements along Stewart Alley, where outdated and collapsed piping has caused stormwater runoff issues. That project remains unfunded. Borough officials hope to pursue grants once additional stormwater funding is available.

Deener said Evans City’s infrastructure challenges largely stem from a combination of aging systems, increased development and decades of partial fixes.

“For years, you did what you could with the least amount of money,” she said. “Now there’s funding available to fix it and rebuild it the right way and we need to take advantage of that while we can.”

She stressed the borough is aggressively pursuing grants to stretch local resources in favor of putting any additional strain on taxpayers.

“We’re doing the best we can with the very limited resources available to us,” Deener said. “We are going after grants and we will continue to go after grants, because that’s really the only way some of these projects get done.”