PORT ANGELES — The City Council continues mulling suicide-prevention fences for the 100-foot-tall Eighth Street bridges.
Council members have said in the past that such barriers would be too expensive.
The city installed crisis-line phone-number signs on the two spans in March.
At Councilwoman Cherie Kidd’s request, city staff will prepare a resolution for the panel’s consideration April 21 that would authorize the city to seek state and federal grants to fund the approximately $1 million safety-barrier project, council members decided Tuesday.
“There is a critical need for higher fencing on our Eighth Street bridges,” Kidd said at the meeting.
Kidd, a former mayor, would spearhead the search.
“A resolution is necessary for me to take the next step to approach other federal and state agencies [to say] that we are looking for funding,” she said.
“I have been offered an opportunity to look for this, and I want you to let me.”
Further details on her efforts “are not appropriate at this time,” she said.
Kidd’s goal is “to give us choices to help our community.”
A 4-foot, 6-inch wall-railing now protects pedestrians who walk and run across the towering Tumwater Gorge and Valley Creek bridges.
Four deaths by suicide have occurred from the spans since 2009, when they replaced the former bridges.
A 21-year-old woman died at the bridges in October and a 76-year-old woman in March.
Councilman Lee Whetham said at Tuesday’s meeting that he was “fully supportive” of considering the resolution with “the [most recent] young member of our city ending her life there.”
“When a person talks about someone jumping off a bridge in this county, it’s the Eighth Street bridges that are the ones that they are drawn to,” Whetham said.
The city is facing budget “belt-tightening,” Whetham added.
“Yet we still have that menace there.”
There also have been 22 suicide threats at or within a block of the bridges that did not result in death since the spans were built six years ago, according to police records.
The 22nd threat was at 5:48 a.m. March 11, Deputy Police Chief Brian Smith said Wednesday.
The 35-year-old man was transported to the Olympic Medical Center emergency room under the state Involuntary Treatment Act for an evaluation, Smith said.
Kidd offered no details about possible funding sources, saying it was “not appropriate at this time” to divulge further information.
“I really don’t have any specifics yet,” she said Wednesday in an interview.
But she is convinced the crisis-line signs are not enough.
After the original bridges were built in 1936, higher fences were installed to prevent people from throwing objects onto the road below, Kidd said.
City officials deemed it too expensive to install higher barriers when the new bridges were built, Kidd said.
Kidd said she has found support among city residents for higher barriers since the new bridges opened in 2009.
“I’ve been concerned about this since I’ve first been on the council,” said Kidd, elected in 2007. She is running for re-election in November.
“I’ve been making some inquiries and gotten some encouragement” from state officials about the possibility of grant funding, she added.
“It’s kind of informal conversation,” she said.
“I was told I need the whole council’s approval to move forward so anyone I approach will realize the full council wants this and not just me.”
Kidd was not aware of any particular program, only that money may be available, she said.
Federal funds are available for “installation of safety barriers and nets on bridges,” according to the 2012 Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act.
The funds are disbursed by the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Surface Transportation Program (STP).
In other action Tuesday, the City Council unanimously approved an $804,845 STP grant as part of a $1.5 million project to design and rehabilitate 18th Street from L Street to the landfill gate.
City Civil Engineer Jim Mahlum said Wednesday the STP program requires a 13.5 percent match that can be composed solely of city funds, solely grant funds or a combination of the two.
The 18th Street project includes a $513,767 state Transportation Improvement Board grant and $175,000 in a city match from solid waste reserves.
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Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5060, or at pgottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
