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Zelienople recently began considering bids for accessibility improvements at the amphitheater in Community Park.

In January, the borough received a $50,000 grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources to make the site compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act, according to borough manager Andrew Spencer.

Council president Mary Hess said the Ayers Foundation also made a $24,000 donation this year for the improvements.

“We’re just finalizing everything, that was an authorization to go to bid,” Spencer said. “We’ve got a few other things, loose ends, to tie up as far as design work goes, and the DCNR actually needs to review that as well as part of the whole bidding process.”

Spencer said there was no estimated total cost for the project yet, but that the focus is improving seating at the venue.

“It would be seating, and it would be really about the access to use the facility,” he said. “Not just park, but actually be there and enjoy the facility.”

The area around the amphitheater is mostly grass, with concrete steps leading to the middle of the stage with two accessible parking spaces.

“We also want to do some other improvements in that area so we are combining a bunch of work at the same time,” council president Mary Hess said. “The grant allows us to make it more accessible and then we want to put tiers in that area so it makes the amphitheater even more usable than it is now.”

Spencer said the borough hopes to undertake the project within the coming year.

“The goal would be to complete it by the end of 2024,” he said.

Council also approved replacing the Zelienople electric substation’s backup batteries Monday.

“Basically the substation hasn’t been upgraded since it was put in,” Spencer said. “So that’s what this is about.”

According to public works director Chad Garland, the batteries have an estimated life span of 20 years. With the station being built in 2000, the batteries are past the end of the their life.

“They are still performing, they are passing the test, but additional cells would need to be replaced this year if we don’t do a full replacement,” he said. “And that would just plague us for years to come — it is time to really overhaul that system and put it back to square one.”

Spencer said work at the substation would also include hardware-related upgrades to guarantee its longevity. The cost of the upgrades are expected to be about $30,000.

“This isn’t a long project,” he said. “We should have this done by the end of the year.”

The upgrades are expected to maintain the life of the station by another 20 years, according to Spencer.

“Barring any changes in the technology, where we would need to make further changes, we should hope to get the same life span out of it,” he said.