By G. SAM PIATT
PDT Staff Writer

SOUTH SHORE, Ky. -- State, county and city officials are expected to attend a public ribbon-cutting ceremony for the recently-completed South Shore Streetscape Project scheduled for noon Monday.

"This completes the first phase of the improvements to the streets and sidewalks and storm water drainage system in the downtown area," said City Commissioner David Piatt.

The $750,000 Phase 1 project was financed chiefly through a grant from the Kentucky Heritage Commission. It was completed by Boone Coleman Construction Co. of West Portsmouth, Ohio. The engineer was Howerton Engineering Co. of Greenup.

The improvements are to continue. The project includes street lights and benches. The next phase, not yet having final approval, will run the underground drainage line on toward the bottom of Morton Hill on Ky. 7 a few hundred yards south of downtown.

Storm water running off Morton Hill during heavy rains ran through the streets rather than underneath them in the old drainage lines.

Some of the old storm water drains had collapsed.

The dedication ceremony will be followed by dinner for officials in the Fellowship Hall of nearby South Shore First United Methodist Church.

Part of the project to be completed next, Piatt said, involves spending $250,000 in upgrading lift stations for the sewage treatment plant.

"Not as glorious a project as Streetscape, but quite necessary," said Piatt, who is the city's finance commissioner and serves on the planning committee for the storm water improvements.

The Heritage Commission also provided a grant that paid for installing a large sign on U.S. 23 entering South Shore on the western end that tells motorists that the city is the "Gateway to the Country Music Highway."

Plans also call for improving a huge existing drain that runs under old Coney Island and directs the runoff from the city into the Ohio River.

The Ohio River has remained at normal pool throughout the summer and fall.