By Mike Kruzman / news@whmi.com

Livingston County officials have approved a resolution that could potentially pave the wave for the proposed bus route between Brighton and Howell to be fully funded through a federal grant.

LETS Director Greg Kellogg took part in the Livingston County Board of Commissioner’s Finance Committee meeting, held virtually, Wednesday morning. On the Committee’s agenda was a resolution authorizing a grant application that would procure nearly $5-million of federal funds for LETS, largely made available from the recent passing of the CARES Act.

Commissioner Doug Helzerman said this is more money than they could have dreamed of, but while government is being generous with it, they need to be very careful on how they spend it.

LETS has been working on a bus route along Grand River between Brighton and Howell that, with several half-hourly stops, would cost $1.1-million annually. Half of that would come from the local sector. This federal grant, though, would cover 100% of the operational costs.

Kellogg said, before the outbreak shut down services, they had begun working on a paired down version of the route, with hourly stops, costing only half as much. He told commissioners, that if the entire pot of grant money was used on this, it could fund the bus route for 9 years.

This could be a safety net for the program, and Kellogg told commissioners that this gives them options and an opportunity to help the local economy when things get more back to normal. He presented a scenario where could do a combination, of half-hour or hour stops, and if they find the service doesn’t look like its working, or the support isn’t there, they can drop. But he adds, that he also doesn’t know if the opportunity to do this is going to come along again, and that he believes this could be a huge economic driver when we come out of this.

Commissioner Bill Green said he was in support of the grant, but that the route decision should also come to the board to be voted on. He added that it would be appreciated if they could also look into helping the rural areas of the county that don’t see as much service.

The resolution was approved unanimously, with Kellogg saying the only thing monies would be used on immediately, would be to cover expenses from March 17th until they open up again.