CLEARLAKE, Calif. — The long wait for a new welcome sign to Woodland Community College’s Lake County Campus in Clearlake is expected to soon be over.

The new sign will sit at the college entrance at 15880 Dam Road Extension.

District officials said Fluoresco Services LLC of Sacramento was awarded both the project for the Lake County sign and one at Woodland Community College for a total of $154,626. The district board approved the award of the contract as part of the consent agenda at its Dec. 16, 2021 meeting.

The report for the December 2021 meeting noted that it’s important for both the Woodland Community College Campus and the Lake County Campus to have functional LED monument signs “that can both display the College locations and provide digital sign messages to the public, students, faculty, and staff.”

Woodland Community College’s existing LED monument digital sign has failed many times and is no longer functional or under the manufacturer’s warranty.

The existing 4-foot by 8-foot plywood sign at the entrance to the Lake County Campus “is worn-out, the poster on the front of the sign is faded and peeling, and there is not a digital LED message component to this sign,” the report said.

“This sign has been in place for a few years now and does not present the Lake County Campus very well,” the report added.

The new two-way sign in Clearlake will allow vehicle traffic along Dam Road Extension “to view messages and be informed of upcoming events and important activities at the campus. It will be much more inviting and will present the campus in a professional and inviting way,” according to the report.

The district said it will be a Daktronics sign with high pixel density which will present a bright readable message during the daytime and dark night hours. It also will have the capability of having the message changed remotely through a cellphone app.

However, with the project still not completed, at the board’s most recent meeting on Nov. 10, during a discussion of a proposed project to build two soccer fields at Woodland Community College for a total cost of $1.9 million, concerns about the sign were raised.

Board Trustee Juan Delgado said the current plywood sign is “embarrassing.”

Board Trustee Doug Harris, who represents Lake County on the board and taught career technical and university prep classes at the Lake County Campus for over 20 years, said the discussion of a respectable new sign for the campus goes back to as far as the beginning of his tenure.

He said there were promises that the new marquee would be installed at the Lake Campus before its 50th anniversary on Oct. 13.

“Those assurances were repeated and they were not kept,” he said.

“That was a really significantly missed opportunity,” Harris added, pointing out that the community and press came out for the 50th anniversary event, and it was an ideal time for coverage of the new sign. “And we missed it.”

He told the board that in the eyes of people in Lake County’s communities, the fact that the project still hadn’t been completed “is a sign of a lack of commitment of this district to that campus.”

Interim Chancellor James Houpis told the board that the new Lake County marquee sign would be finished by January.

Harris said he had been promised the sign would be completed by August, then September and then January. He said he’s been hearing those assurances for 15 years.

No action by the board was agendized regarding the sign at the Nov. 10 meeting. However, a vote on whether or not to direct the soccer field project to move forward, funded by the 2006 Measure J bond, failed.

Cheresse Salamanca, Houpis’ executive assistant, confirmed that the soccer fields project is presently not approved to go forward. “Beyond that, it may or may not be brought back to the Board at a future date.”

Clearlake City Manager Alan Flora told Lake County News that the city’s planning department issued a permit for the new sign on Oct. 27.

Flora said the city has since been in contact with district officials regarding their plans to move forward with completing the sign project.

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