Bay Roberts shifts rec budget to qualify for Bay Arena grant
By Olivia Bradbury / Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Bay Roberts council has agreed to take money out of its Recreation Department’s operating budget to make it eligible to apply for a provincial funding program to make electrical upgrades at the Bay Arena.
Chief Administrative Officer Dave Tibbo explained that while the opportunities to apply for provincial grants are greatly appreciated, it usually means staff have to suddenly find the money to cover the Town’s share for proposed projects in order to qualify for them. Most grants are cost-shared between the two levels of government. That can often mean taking money from operating budgets instead of borrowing it as you normally would for capital works projects.
“Some of these grants are not one hundred percent funded. So, we feel as a management team, and we’ve chatted about it, is when we have to take a portion of our operating money out of our budget that we didn’t know about, we need to bring it to council,” Tibbo said.
The electrical upgrades will cost $30,000. Through a special assistance grant, 60 percent of the project’s cost would be paid by the provincial government, while the other 40 percent would be paid by the municipal government. This means the Town of Bay Roberts would be responsible for $12,000 of the project’s cost.
“I’m glad to say our manager of stadium operations and now our new director of recreation have money in their budget to cover that $12,000,” Tibbo reported to council at its March 12 public meeting.
Tibbo noted that much of the work listed in the application had already been identified by the Town’s occupational health and safety committee as needing to be done for safety reasons.
Councillor Dean Franey made the motion to apply for the grant, and it was seconded by Councillor Perry Bowering.
“It is just really good to see that we can take 12,000 of our dollars and turn it into $30,000 with the use of grants, so good work on the director, CAO, and the manager of operations up to the stadium to leverage our money to get some well-needed work done,” said Franey.