MAGNOLIA SPRINGS — The Magnolia Springs Town Council is looking into re-allocating the town’s grant funds from the British Petroleum Deepwater Horizon oil spill for a small dock area for public and emergency use.

“We had a balance left so we put a grant request in on those funds for a dock area and elevated walkway down through some wetlands behind Jesse’s Restaurant, and it was about $220,000,” Mayor Charles Houser said. “Apparently, it has to be put on a new form, so we’ll re-submit it and see if it gets approved.”

The dock would be a public place, but it would also serve as an emergency dock for the town’s fire department.

“It would be for the fire department to have a boat there in case of emergencies,” Houser said. “It would be a public area. We would have educational signs in the wetland area and signs indicating what happened during the oil spill and what area it had. So it will have educational kiosks.”

Houser said the town does have another idea for how to spend the funds if a re-allocation request is accepted.

“We had an embankment, or a minicliff, fall into the river and dump tons of sedimentation into the river east of the town,” Houser said. “So, another project we want to tackle would be to take care of that. We’d either have to dredge or dig and shore up the shoreline."

Baldwin County’s request to allocate its grant funds to build a $1 million boat launch in Lillian was denied, and one Magnolia Springs council member said at Tuesday’s council meeting that the city of Daphne did not get its re-allocation request accepted either. However, Daphne council members contend that they don’t think a formal request has been submitted.

“The council has talked about making a formal application or formal request to (Gov. Robert Bentley) for re-allocating the money to the central communication system, which would cost around $300,000,” Daphne Councilman Derek Boulware said. “All we’ve done so far is talked about it.”

“(Daphne Mayor Fred Small) made a request back in November, and we haven’t heard anything in response,” Daphne Council President Cathy Barnette said. “The mayor’s office may have received some correspondence that the council is not aware of.”

The Magnolia Springs council said the rumors are that the grant re-allocation request must deal specifically with the oil spill incident. Houser said that “until they change that, I don’t think anyone will be approved.”

“I don’t really know. I’ve never seen that in writing,” Houser said. “That’s just what we’ve been told. The Alabama Department of Environmental Management was in charge of dispersing the money during the oil spill. Now it’s with Alabama Emergency Management Association, and it’s just about finding out how they want us to submit it.”

Councilman Bob Holk said he thinks the town just needs to alter how they are writing the re-allocation request.

“Maybe we need to write our grant more for emergency response,” he said.

The town received the grant in two payments, Houser said. The first was for $200,000, and the second was for $500,000. The town has spent around $480,000 in total, Houser said, and it’s just looking to re-allocate the remaining balance for a town project.

“We spent a lot of (the grant) right after the oil spill. Almost all the money went to the barges and other equipment had at the mouth between Weeks Bay and Mobile Bay to stop the oil from coming in,” Houser said. “All we’re asking for is permission to spend the balance of the money.”