The City of Staunton adopted the Uniontown Neighborhood Action Plan in December 2023 and identified four primary areas of recommendations.
An application for grant funding was submitted to enable the city to reach the goals of reinvestment, sense of community, preservation and reestablishment of connections with Uniontown. City staff contracted the Timmons Group engineering firm to develop cost estimates, prepare application conceptual exhibits, complete a cost-benefit analysis and conduct pavement core sampling for the application.
Other community partners in the application process included the Central Shenandoah Planning District Commission, city staff in Community Development, Public Works, Finance and the City Manager‘s office.
“We’re very excited to discuss this tonight,” said Staunton City Manager Leslie Beauregard Thursday night at a regular meeting of the Staunton City Council.
Assistant City Manager Amanda Kaufman said the discussion was intended to provide an update on the city’s application for a Better Utilizing Investments to Leverage Development (BUILD) grant through the U.S. Department of Transportation.
“We submitted it at the end of January for $8.9 million to assist with some goals set out in the Uniontown Neighborhood Action Plan,” Kaufman said.
Kaufman said the city should hear in late July about the application.
National Avenue south of the railroad would be completely reconstructed with new pavement, signals and a sidewalk which would connect into a new pedestrian and bicycle bridge. All other roads would also be repaved.
A large part of the plan involves reconnecting and replacing underground water utilities to Uniontown and new sewer lines.
A shared-use path along Richmond Avenue/U.S. 250 would ensure pedestrian safety to and from Uniontown.
Letters of support for the city’s application include U.S. Sen. Mark R. Warner, U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine, Virginia Department of Transportation, Greater Augusta Regional Chamber of Commerce, Staunton Planning Commission, Historic Staunton Foundation, Uniontown Steering Committee, the Staunton branch of the NAACP, the Shenandoah Valley Bicycle Coalition and the Staunton Augusta County African American Research Society.
“We have significant support for this endeavor,” Kaufman said.
The grant funding allows for a generous timeline of four years to obligate funds and then four years to spend the funding. If funding is approved, the revitalization plan could be completed by mid 2030.
Timmons Group estimated costs for all plans of revitalization of Uniontown total is $14.4 million. The city asked the U.S. DOT for $8.9 million of grant funding. The grant funding does not require a cost match by the city, however, according to Kaufman, the city must be competitive for the grant funding by showing cost match funding. The city already allotted funds in its Capital Improvement Plan for Uniontown revitalization. By early July 2025, the city will have approximately $700,000 set aside for Uniontown from the CIP.
“If we get the grant, we can do everything that we’ve talked about tonight,” Kaufman said. The city would also be able to return more than $2 million to the water fund and more than $1 million to the sewer fund for future city needs. Funding would also remain in the Uniontown fund for revitalization plans.
If the federal grant funding is not approved, three streets in Uniontown are eligible for funding from VDOT.
Staunton City Council approved a motion to allocate funding from the Uniontown Fund, the Water Fund and the Sewer Fund to serve as the city’s cost share amount should the city be approved for the grant funding in July.
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Rebecca Barnabi
