Proposed bike path near Lake McClure trails in voting

A proposed downhill mountain bike trail near Lake McClure has fallen behind in the race for grant funding, the Merced Irrigation District reported Monday.

Exchequer Bike Park, on MID property next to Lake McClure, is competing for a $100,000 private grant to construct a double-black-diamond trail.

As of Monday afternoon, the project was behind a Reno-area proposal by fewer than 200 votes, MID spokesman Mike Jensen said.

“If Exchequer receives this grant, people will be coming here for competitions from across the state and they will need places to eat and sleep. It will be good for our entire community,” Jensen said. “The vote is extremely narrow. It would be a shame for Merced to miss out on such a tremendous opportunity by such a small margin of votes.”

The online voting competition began a week ago.

“We are talking about bringing people from all over the state to our community for race events. This will benefit restaurants, hotels and everything in between,” said Bret Theodozio, MID parks and recreation director.

Voting will continue until Sunday at www.bellhelmets.com/bell-built.

“If this is built, it will bring riders and large competitions from throughout northern California to our community,” said Grant Parker, President of the Exchequer Riders Club. “This is ours to lose. We need every vote we can get right now.”

This story was originally published April 20, 2015 at 4:39 PM with the headline "Proposed bike path near Lake McClure trails in voting."