The Marshall County Council had multiple requests to apply for grants during their meeting Monday.
John Grolich, head of the Local Emergency Plan Commission asked for approval to apply for a hazardous material training grant when it becomes available in 2018. Grolich told the board he typically only gets about 6 days from when the grant notice is sent out to when he must file intent to apply. He also said the grant is an 80/20 match and the LEPC has funds available for the required match.
The County Council approved his request.
Prosecuting Attorney Nelson Chipman was granted approval to apply for two grants, one from IPAC and the other from the Governor’s Commission for a Drug Free Indiana. Each grant is for $2,000 and if successful the funding will be used for confidential drug buy money. The Drug Free Indiana grant also requests $773.00 for undercover camera equipment.
The Marshall County Health Department will apply for a $2,500 grant to test our high risk population, IV drug users for Hepatitis C. Christine Stinson, director of the Health Department told the council she is working with Community Corrections and the Probation Department to located possible candidates. Each person tested will be given a $10 gift card for groceries. The goal is to test 250 people next year. Stinson did say this is a competitive grant and only 16 of the 92 counties will be awarded.
Ward Byers from Community Corrections was granted permission to apply for the Fiscal Year 2019 Budget Grant from the State of Indiana. This current fiscal year the budget amount is $403,100. Byers was unsure if there would be an increase for the next grant cycle or not.
The final grant application approval went to the Marshall County 4-H Fair Board. Last month the board was notified that they were unsuccessful in applying for an OCRA grant to help fund a Community Center on the fairgrounds property in Argos.
Angle Balsley fair board secretary and Rob Hurford fair board president appeared before the county council Monday and said an additional grant round has opened for February 2018 and the intention letter is due December 1st. They asked for approval to re-apply, understanding now what kept may have kept them from being awarded a grant in the last round.
Balsley said the grant is for low to medium income families and while their rents were low they had not built in enough of a difference. The new application will raise the base rent slightly higher for the average income and provide a sliding scale for lower income families to rent the facility as well as a non-profit rental rate. Balsley also noted that typically there are 8 applicants for the grants and 4 are awarded. This last grant round had 14 applicants.
The OCRA grant is for $500,000 toward the $800,000 construction project. Fundraising and a bank loan will provided the remainder of the financing needed for the project. The County Council gave their blessing to the grant application.
