DAPHNE, Ala.—The Daphne City Council will wait and get clearer guidelines on potential re-allocation of funds received from the British Petroleum oil spill incident, but there will be an ordinance at Tuesday’s meeting to acknowledge and authorize the spending for the additional $465,000 the city received from the grant.

“I think we’re just going to wait and see,” Councilwoman Cathy Barnette said. “We’re hoping there will be some guidance for re-allocating the funds. We’re going to defer it to the February work session.”

The city received a $965,000 grant from the state after an oil rig exploded off the coast of Louisiana on April 20, 10 and the grant outlines that funds should be spent for emergency situations and projects. The grant came in two parts, with the first part being the $500,000 authorized by the council for the city to spend, but the council has not yet authorized to spend the second part, which totals $465,000. The city has spent around $420,000 of the grant, and an additional $120,000 will be spent pending the city’s approval to use the second part of the grant. This would leave the city with around $425,000 left.

“We have an ordinance on the agenda (for next Tuesday’s meeting), which will essentially acknowledge the second grant amount,” Councilman Derek Boulware said. “A portion of that ordinance explains the purpose of what this money is for. It’s a broad purpose. Part of it describes the use of money for public works and public safety, and that is a broad use, but that is the wording in there. If we pass that ordinance on Monday, it sets up what the idea of this money is for … Whatever we ask for the state to re-allocate, it would be in the guidelines of public safety and public service.”

Many have stated that if the city does not spend the money soon, it could be returned to the state.

“I think we should spend it as quickly as possibly as long as we can justify it,” Public Works Director Richard Johnson said at Monday’s finance committee meeting.

Mayor Fred Small told the council at a previous work session that he is looking into getting the funds re-allocated for general city projects, but the state has frozen all re-allocations, according to Fire Marshal Chip Martin.

Daphne High School Principal Meredith Horton asked the Daphne finance committee to keep DHS parking lot improvements in mind if they move forward and gain state approval to re-allocate the funds.

“I’d like to ask that you please keep us in mind,” she said. “We have the same parking lot that we had when the school was built, and it’s in terrible shape.” Small mentioned at a previous council meeting that the cost for re-furbishing the DHS parking lot would be around $200,000.

Horton also said the school wanted to install cameras.

“It’s a liability issue,” she said about the lack of surveillance equipment.

“That’s a little premature because we don’t have any criteria,” Barnette said about Horton’s request. “If we’re trying to get a message across, it’s too early to start lobbying for these funds right now because we have no idea what the position of the new governor and new (Emergency Management Agency) director are, so we don’t have any criteria to base these requests.”

Boulware said Horton’s requests would not fall under the uses of public safety and public service.