By Jeff Green
North Jersey.com
CLIFTON – City officials are applying for more than $200,000 in state road resurfacing aid that they plan to put toward a controversial sidewalk project on Dwas Line Road - a move that the state says would not be allowed.
The city submitted a grant application to the state Department of Transportation in October, asking for about $238,000 to repave a portion of Dwas Line – a main artery through the city’s Rosemawr section. Meanwhile, the city had already awarded a contract to do the same road work with city funds.
City Manager Nick Villano has said if the grant is awarded, he intends to ask the state to reallocate the money from the stated purpose of a repaving project to the work of installing sidewalks on Dwas Line – a project some officials have refused to dedicate city money for, including Mayor James Anzaldi.
But in a series of emails, a transportation department spokesman, Kevin Israel, has said the state would not permit Clifton to request such a change. Municipal aid regulations, “internal controls” and procedures “prevent a town from reallocating the funds” from grants, he said.
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