Columbia Basin Trust (CBT) offers services, programs, initiatives, and financial investments to the residents of the Columbia Basin. The Trust was created in order to benefit the region after Canada and the United States built multiple dams on the Columbia River. Every municipality in the Columbia Basin receives a portion of the Trust funding, and the municipal councils decide where that funding goes.
For 2017/2018, the City of Kimberley will be allocating $100,571.36 of the CBT funding to over 35 organizations in Kimberley and the surrounding areas.
It was decided at a Council Meeting on Monday, May 8 that some of the funds would be consolidated and re-allocated to better serve the organizations who applied for the grants.
Counsellor Bev Middlebrook suggested, “just to keep it simple, there are two organizations that are asking for $250.00 each, both of those organizations are used by this community and have been used for decades which is the Wasa washroom, and the Fish Hatchery.”
With that information, Council agreed to take any grants that were $100.00 or less and consolidate them to a total of $255.81. This total will then be re-allocated to those two organizations in need of more funding; the Wasa Recreation Society for their Washroom Upgrade and the Freshwater Fisheries Society of BC for their Kootenay Trout Hatchery Outreach Programs for 2017/18.
Mayor Don McKormick explained, “within this group of 43 different projects, at least half of them are regional projects where either it’s people from the region coming into Kimberley, or Kimberley that is using regional facilities. I think the reality we have today is that it’s very much a regional world that we live in, particularly with the non-profit organizations.”
The full list of funding allocations with the exception of those under $100.00 can be seen on the Regular Council Meeting Agenda at https://kimberley.civicweb.net/filepro/documents/42945?preview=46321.