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Salem city officials want to build a footbridge from Riverfront Park to Minto-Brown Island, but there’s a problem: they’re about $6 million short.

They’re brainstorming this week on possible solutions, including using $3 million in urban renewal funds on top of the $2 million in urban renewal funds they’ve already earmarked for the project. Doing that means other urban renewal fund projects downtown will be sacrificed.

According to a staff report to the city council, officials expected to get more money from assorted grant sources, but the dollars have only been trickling in. So far, the city has only received $60,000 from the Oregon Business Development Department’s Brownfields Redevelopment Program for an environmental assessment.

Among the potential grant sources the city council is eyeing is $1 million from the Oregon Department of Transportation as well as $24,540 in matching funds from the city’s Capital Construction Fund.

The staff report adds that some possible funding sources backed away from the project, believing the overall $8 million price tag is too steep.

Part of that cost includes paying Capt. Richard Chesbrough of the Willamette Queen $50,000 a year for five years because his sternwheeler could not navigate under the proposed bridge. The payments would be to compensate him for the loss of business during the months when the water is too high in the Willamette Slough for him to operate his riverboat.