BOWDEN - Mayor Robb Stuart is relieved that the Municipal Sustainability Initiative (MSI) remained intact in the provincial budget, because the town was hoping to get money from it to help fund work in the community.
"The MSI is the one we were worried about, right? And it seems to be holding where it was," Stuart said during an interview with the Albertan.
The provincial budget was announced March 16. The total pool of MSI money is $846 million.
The town would like to make use of grant money from that program to help cover costs for a new sewage lift station in the town.
Stuart says town council was worried that the fund might be cut back. He compares it to infrastructure money announced by the federal government earlier.
"They took $300 million of federal money and put it into their own projects. You applied for it. But they just said, well no, they were better able to decide what was in our best interest, so they just put it in some infrastructure of their own," he says.
He says as a result of that, council was concerned about what might happen to the MSI.
"I'm happy there are not a lot of cuts, because I was worried about that. (We'll) wait and see, though," Stuart says.
"Going for grant funding is kind of an art in itself and some people are really good at it and we haven't quite got the expertise; over the years we haven't."
"Going for grant funding is kind of an art in itself and some people are really good at it and we haven't quite got the expertise; over the years we haven't." ROBB STUART BOWDEN MAYOR
