State Museum loading dock probable

A plan to construct a loading dock and storage area on the south side of the Nevada State Museum won approval from Carson City’s Historic Resources Commission Thursday.

The project, which next will go before the city’s Planning Commission, is along the Guild Wing built in 1959 behind the historic U.S. Mint building to the west. Work also will include replacement of a freight elevator with associated improvements. There will be a seven-foot hedge for screening along part of it and a four-foot hedge to screen a roll-up door. The project in part is for moving large objects in and out of the museum.

Proposed by the State of Nevada Public Works Division, it will be done with stucco appearance and paint will be used that “still blends in well with the building,” said Susan Dorr Pansky, city planning manager.

Paul Cavin, the architect, appeared before the HRC and also said the project is designed to fit in with the building.

The commission elected Jed Block to serve as 2014 chairman, replacing Michael Drews. Robert Darney was re-elected vice chairman.

Pansky reported that a $20,000 grant request for 2014 has been submitted to the State Historical Preservation Office in hopes of doing a Kings Canyon Road cultural resources inventory, which also would require a $15,000 match. The money actually is National Park Service funding that would pass through the state’s Historical Preservation Office if all or part of the $20,000 grant is awarded.

Kings Canyon Road was part of the old Lincoln Highway that spanned the nation. Pansky said she expects to learn how the grant request fared by the end of March.

The commission also reviewed seven possible nominees for 2014 Carson City Historic Preservation Awards for outstanding achievements in the field, a half dozen of them residences and the seventh the Brewery Arts Center at 449 W. King St. Block suggested they hold off on the BAC because more work may yet be done and an award could come after all of it is completed.

Board members and the public were invited to submit any other potential candidates by March 1 to Pansky at the planning division in the Business Resource Innovation Center (BRIC). The commission will decide on the final group at the March HRC meeting. Awards will go to recipients in May, which is Historic Preservation Month.