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Summit County May Have Found Room In Budget For Nonprofit Grants

The Summit County Council in their regular meeting Wednesday are scheduled to have their last work session on the 2019 budget, prior to public hearings for the following two weeks.

Among the items, the County Manager’s previous recommendation to drop grant funding for nonprofits next year, has been revised. The new plan is that nine of those nonprofits will get money after all.

Earlier in the fall, County Manager Tom Fisher had recommended no other nonprofit grant for next year, since the county was granting $250,000 for the new Children’s Justice Center facility.

Now, Fisher said they’ve been able to find some additional funding.

“There is a revenue source and I’m not going to be able to name it exactly this second, but it has to do with how we budgeted for health insurance this year. The cost of that has come in a little better than we expected. So a lower cost which has allowed some other revenues to be available. With that discussion the council asked and I provided them a recommendation several weeks ago around the nonprofits and youth recreation.”

The staff report said they will also find some monies by reducing their contribution to the county’s fund balance. Under the revised recommendations, three grants of $10,000 or over, apiece, will go to Park City Leadership, People’s Health Clinic, and the Peace House. Grants of $5,000 will go to Connect, Summit Land Conservancy, Nuzzle and Co., PC Tots, and Habitat for Humanity and $2,500 is recommended for PandoLabs.

Fisher also noted that $25,000 each is recommended for South Summit and North Summit Youth Recreation. That’s a reduction in funding.

“The 2018 budget we took out a contribution for recreation to the Snyderville Basin area. It has been the desire of the council to slowly wean the recreation areas off of general fund monies supporting that. We’re recommending a reduction in funding from the 2018 year.”

The council will also look at some trail projects. Fisher said they’re considering the use of Transient Room Tax money to plan and install enhancements on the Rail/Trail corridor, from Park City to Echo.

“There’s some interest in exploring that, we’ve talked to state parks about that as well they would be interested in that also.” Fisher said that paving the trail could be a possibility, “Right now the trail is used by everything from bicycles to horses, hikers, all that type of activity. Maybe paving a portion of it and leaving a portion of it a soft trail for equine use would be a thing that we could explore.”

They will also consider using the same fund source to complete the trail along State Road 32 in South Summit.

“The South Summit Trails group received one of our grants over the last year to do some environmental background work on the remaining portion between about the Marion area to Kamas to finish that trail. I’m not exactly sure where they’re at in that process but the council has expressed interest in completing that trail between Kamas and Marion. So, if we do want to explore that we could use the Transient Room Tax source on something like that. Probably some more background work would be needed in 2019 to develop that project. Looking ahead into 2020 or 2021 as an actual construction year if we decide to pursue that.”

Another topic is the proposal to extend Chalk Creek Road to link up with the Mirror Lake Highway. But Fisher said he doesn’t think the county will move forward on that.

“I don’t think we’re going to have a long discussion about that. I think the last couple of months have brought some clarity to the council that they really don’t want to move forward with that at this point. So, unless there is a large public contingent that comes in just banging on the table to move forward with that, I doubt that one will move forward.”

A public hearing on December 5th is scheduled in the Basin, at the Richins Services Building. The second hearing, and a decision session, is set for December 12th in Coalville.

Known for getting all the facts right, as well as his distinctive sign-off, Rick covered Summit County meetings and issues for 35 years on KPCW. He now heads the Friday Film Review team.
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