The Berrien County Board of Commissioners has been asked to approve a resolution of support for the MDOT project to reconstruct Main Street in St. Joseph in 2027.

Speaking at Thursday’s regular meeting, the administration committee’s Jim Curran said the committee’s members mostly declined to sign the resolution when it was presented to them. Curran was among the nos. He said he didn’t want to set a precedent of publicly backing projects that aren’t the county’s.

“It seems to me like this is the city of St. Joe project, not us,” Curran said. “So when things go sideways out here and people get mad, I would prefer they go to the city and not us. So if we do this resolution, I don’t want to put a bullseye on our back because really we have nothing to do with it.”

Commissioner Sharon Tyler said after problems with an MDOT project on US-12 in Niles and the paid parking saga in St. Joseph, she didn’t want to indicate support for the Main Street work.

“So I decided I am going to play it safe,” Tyler said. “I don’t need to add additional work to our county road department because they will be fielding calls. Just because you support it, people will think that we totally embrace it.”

Tyler said she’s not opposed to the project, but she’ll stay out of it.

Commissioners are concerned about what the Main Street work will mean for county business with the administration building right there and the courthouse nearby. Tyler said the courts are worried about whether they’ll have to move proceedings to Niles when construction is going on. Sheriff Chuck Heit also chimed in and said he’s concerned about ambulance access to the jail.

The only member of the administration committee to sign the resolution of support was Commissioner Dave Vollrath, who said MDOT’s going through with the work either way and he thinks it will work around the challenges it creates.

The resolution of support may, or may not, come before the full county board next week.