Grants can be tricky. Competing for them can be trickier.
, Richmond News Staff
10-07-2009
Economic development specialist and entrepreneuer Molly McGovern should know. Her expertise has written many a Ray County public infrastructure grant. She’s assisted Richmond, Henrietta and Hardin in finding development grant dollars in a challenging economic time, as well as Ray County officials.
She’s recently assisted Hardin and Henrietta in finding ways to fund major water line-replacement projects. She currently awaits engineering data from Hardin –which Hardin Mayor Bob McCorkendale said is several months past due – to possibly formulate grants for both line replacement and “piggybacked” street-improvement funds.
Down the road in Henrietta, the city council hopes to put wheels in motion by late 2009 or early 2010 to replace its water treatment plant and replace and repair aging water lines.
“It’s a pretty small world if you need specific improvements. There’s only a few locations to get that correct grant,” McGovern said. “Each grant has a purpose, and funding is available to assist the kind of client the grant agency wants to assist and to solve the big problems they want to solve. When a city has a water or sewer need, there’s a specific solution.”
So it carries some weight when says this isn’t just a competitive time to write grants, though she said it’s a small, competitive world when it comes to fund-seeking. It’s also an “unusual” one, she said.
She specializes in federal public infrastructure grant dollars – she said she doesn’t pursue foundation grants – because it’s an extension of her background. She spent 18 years in community development in Excelsior Springs, followed by a tenure with the Mid-America Regional Council. Helping communities fund projects through federal or state assistance seemed a given.
Water and sewer infrastructure needs top most communities’ wish lists, largely because they’re so crucial to public health and so costly. Expensive to begin with, smaller communities don’t get any more breathing room because smaller communities bring in less user-fee revenue to go around.
The federal stimulus plans opened up around 300 public infrastructure grant programs, all hoping to generate “shovel-ready” jobs that put Americans back to work. There’s more funds to go around but a lot more people wanting them.
Since the grants often come with administrative red-tape requirements and provisos, McGovern explains there’s a sense of urgency to do what needs to be done to qualify for the money race before a small window of time closes.
“This year, like no other, there is a tremendous amount of funding available to the community,” she said. That’s the good news. “And yes, there is more competition. That’s the result of the government wanting to have more impact on the recession by getting more money into construction projects quickly.”
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