Money, money, money -- Rossland's portion of the ReDi Grant allocations
By Rossland Telegraph
Before the Committee-of-the Whole meeting to decide which applicants will get how much of the available funding, Rossland’s City Council members read and considered over 800 pages of material from 64 applicants for Columbia Basin Trust’s ReDi Grant program.
All Council members attended the meeting, as did CAO Bryan Teasdale, Executive Assistant Rachel Newton, and CFO Craig McDonald, who crunched the numbers. Patrick Checknita of Columbia Basin Trust also attended, and representatives of many applicant organizations filled the public gallery to overflowing.
“ReDi” stands for “Resident Directed” and Rossland’s City Council represents residents in allocating the funding. Their first collective decision is whether each of the applicants will even be considered for funding. This is done by a show of hands; if an applicant receives less than four votes from the seven-member council, it will not be considered for a share of the funding.
This year, half the applicants made the cut; 32 groups received some funding. And, since the funding consisted of $51,410, and the total of the amounts requested by applicants far exceeded that, Council had to make more hard decisions.
How do they make those decisions? They take into account the criteria already agreed upon, such as how a project benefits the community, and whether it addresses a gap in service, among other things. First, anyone with a conflict of interest declares that, and is excluded from any decision about the organization involved. Then each Council member decides how much of the available funding each eligible applicant should get. Then their allocations are averaged, and that is the final allocation from Rossland.
Rossland’s allocation is forwarded to the Regional District of Kootenay Boundary (RDKB) to be included in their final decisions, taking into account the allocations from other communities.
The final amounts allocated by Rossland are as follows:
BC Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals: $621.35
Central Kootenay Invasive Species Society: 1,008.21
Columbia Basin Environmental Education Network: 1,000.00
Communities in Faith Pastoral Charge: 2,000.00
Ecole des Sept-sommets: 3,065.71
Family Action Network of the Lower Columbia: 1,516.14
Greater Trail Hospice Society: 973.43
Kootenay Columbia Trails Society: 3,950.00
Kootenay South Youth Soccer Association: 1,333.33
Living Lakes Canada Society: 704.86
Lower Columbia Affordable Housing Society: 2,299.07
Lower Columbia Development Team Society: 842.86
Rossland and District Search and Rescue Society: 4,428.71
Rossland Child Care Society – Golden Bear Children’s Centre: 3,241.07
Rossland Council for Arts and Culture: 1,216.00
Rossland Fall Fair Core Group: 1,428.57
Rossland Golden City Days Festival Society: 1,607.14
Rossland Historical Museum & Archives Association: 1,428.57
Rossland Light Opera Players Society: 2,671.43
Rossland Mountain Film Festival: 1,039.29
Rossland Public Library Association: 434.80
Rossland Winter Carnival Society: 3,500.00
Special Olympics British Columbia Society — Trail Local: 357.14
Take a Hike Youth Mental Health Foundation: 1,464.29
Team GIVE’R Foundation: 775.00
The Black Jack Cross Country Ski Club Society: 988.00
The Canadian Red Cross Society: 566.14
The Rossland Gold Fever Follies: 2,803.57
Tourism Rossland Society: 1,162.50
Trail Association for Community Living: 685.71
Trail Chamber of Commerce: 1,225.67
West Kootenay Minor Lacrosse Association: 1,071.43
As mentioned above, these amounts are not final; the RDKB will make the final decisions at an upcoming meeting.
