Thumbnail photo: Construction began on the Fred Endert Municipal Pool's roof on Monday. | courtesy of Andrew Goff Councilman Daran Dooley was absent. Among the items discussed at Monday’s Crescent City Council meeting: CDBG grant: City Councilors authorized staff to establish a new fund for the $1.8 million it received in 2024 Community Development Block Grant dollars. According to City Manager Eric Wier, about $300,000 of that money will go toward the Family Resource Center of the Redwoods for its Pacific Pantry program while another $1.5 million will be used to establish a business loan program. The city and county applied for the $1.5 million grant for the business loan program together, Wier said. A consultant, Kelseyville,California-based Community Development Services, will implement the business loan program, the city manager told councilors. “It will be for forgivable loans to businesses for job creation,” he said, adding that the city will likely begin promoting the program in either September or October. Wier said the most recent business loan program the city established included a micro-enterprise component and was focusing on assisting businesses through the COVID-19 pandemic. The program the city is currently working on will be similar, but will offer $35,000 loans per job created, the city manager said. “There will be an application period,” he said. “We’ll then vet those applications to make sure they meet the program requirements of that job creation and have the proper financials in place and then we’ll be able to hopefully proceed with these loans.” City Council stipends: At the mayor’s request, the City Council will hear a presentation and have a discussion about the stipends they receive as elected officials. “What I envision is that there would be a staff report on the historical stipend for council members and how long it’s been since that stipend has been looked at or increased,” Mayor Ray Altman told his colleagues, “and then have the Council look at it and make a decision on whether or not that is a good decision.” City councilors currently receive a stipend of $610.92 per month, which is $7,331 per year, Finance Director Linda Leaver told Redwood Voice. Stipends haven’t been changed since 2008. At Monday’s meeting, Councilman Jason Greenough said he’s willing to have a discussion, though he’s not sure he wants to increase his stipend. Mayor Pro Tem Isaiah Wright said he was willing to hear a report on stipends as well. Swimming pool roof project: Public Works Director Dave Yeager said about 60% of the sheeting on the Fred Endert Municipal Swimming Pool’s roof will need to be replaced. Yeager came to the City Council on Day 1 of a 16-day pool closure and roof replacement project. The plywood sheeting is paper thin and the wooden beams supporting it is failing, he said. “We’re probably at or under the sheeting quantity we were anticipating [needing],” he said. “We’re still in our contingency budget based on where we’re at with the project.” The City Council had contracted with Red Sky Roofing last month to replace the facility’s asphalt roof with a steel seam roof. Seagulls had poked hundreds of pinholes into the previous roof, the public works director said, and what staff had written off as condensation was actual rainwater dripping into the pool. Bird droppings had been eating away at the membrane holding the gravel shingles in place and there were bare patches. In addition to fixing the roof, the city will take advantage of the pool closure to do some other repairs. This includes partially draining the pool to repair a crack “that was fixed when the pool was empty the last time.”