Sweetwater leaders have secured a $2.5 million line of credit from Regions Bank to assist with improvements at the city's senior center and the second phase of a sewer drainage project.

A bank representative was present at Monday's City Commission meeting to approve the loan. The credit line will finance construction work for the remodeling and expansion of the Claude and Mildred Pepper Senior Center, which began last month. The project is being funded by a $1 million Community Development Block Grant.

The credit line will also finance construction work for the installation of storm water drainage pumps between Southwest 107th and 109th avenues between West Flagler and Southwest Eighth streets.

The project, which will eventually expand to Southwest 112th Avenue, is being funded by almost $9 million in federal and local grants. The work is tentatively scheduled to begin in January.

``Both of these projects are extremely important to the city of Sweetwater,'' Chief of Staff Frank Lago said. ``The senior center, especially, needed a huge face-lift. We hope to have the new center open by mid-December or early January.''

Also at the meeting:

• City Clerk Val Schmidt announced that the Florida Department of Education nominated Sweetwater Elementary School as a National Title I Distinguished School for 2008-09. The school will be recognized at a conference in Washington, D.C., Jan. 21-24.

• Schmidt said that Deputy City Clerk Carmen Garcia has been appointed the new president of the Miami-Dade County Municipal Clerks Association. Schmidt herself is a past president.

• Commissioner Prisca Barreto announced the city is now taking applications for the 14th annual Christmas House Decorating Program contest in which several prizes will be awarded. For more information, call City Hall at 305-221-0411.

Join the discussion

The Miami Herald is pleased to provide this opportunity to share information, experiences and observations about what's in the news. Some of the comments may be reprinted elsewhere in the site or in the newspaper. We encourage lively, open debate on the issues of the day, and ask that you refrain from profanity, hate speech, personal comments and remarks that are off point. In order to post comments, you must be a registered user of MiamiHerald.com. Your username will show along with the comments you post. Thank you for taking the time to offer your thoughts.

     Showing: Oldest first Newest first Most-recommended first Least-recommended first

@Nyx.AuthorDisplayName@ wrote on @Nyx.PostedAtTime@:

@Nyx.repliedToText@

@Nyx.replyAnswerText@

Reply to this Comment @Nyx.Recommender@ @Nyx.AbuseReporter@