Colchester’s community grant requests reaching point of review

Funding requests by nonprofit community groups for grants from the Municipality of Colchester total more than a half-million dollars for the upcoming fiscal year.

And while Mayor Christine Blair said the grants are important for the community groups that request them, she also acknowledged they have reached a point where the program requires careful scrutiny.

“We recognize that we are a municipal government and that we have to provide services to the people in the community and the grants program is a way of providing service to people,” she said.

“But we do have to review the process, no question.

“We have to have a stronger look at it.”

The municipality has received 30 requests for community grants totalling $517,000, ranging in amounts from $900 to $200,000. Twenty-eight of those groups recently made presentations to council.

The $200,000 request came from the Nova Scotia Provincial Exhibition Commission for funding to be used for infrastructure improvements to Exhibition Hall.

Council will decide on which requests it will support during budget deliberations in April.

Last year, council approved $209,500 in community grants after receiving requests for $402,969.

Blair said the original idea of setting up the grant program was to assist small, non-profit groups that benefit the community they are in and is a concept she fully supports.

“We are very pro, re maintaining our community halls in small communities because they are the centres of communities,” she said. “And it’s very important that communities have that facility to go to.”