The British Columbia government website has been rolling through the spending announcements in a rapid fire fashion these last few days, community after community standing ready to receive their share of the Federal/Provincial bounty that seems to be the currency of development these days.
You have to go pretty deep into the rolling stock of infrastructure money, but eventually you will stumble across the latest announcement of interest to Prince Rupert and Port Edward, an April 6th review of some of the funding coming our way thanks to Stockwell Day, the Conservative Minister of International Trade and Minister for the Asia-Pacific Gateway and his provincial counterpart in forestry Pat Bell, filling in for Community Development Minister Kevin Krueger.
The two outlined the directions that 1.6 million dollars are going in on the North coast, a list of projects that will soon take shape in the two communities.
Among some of the highlights for Port Edward are $400,000 in federal and provincial Towns for Tomorrow funding to continue replacing water mains, $397,267 through the first instalment of the Province’s Strategic Community Investment Fund and $502 from the Climate Action Revenue Incentive Program.
Prince Rupert will receive funding of $100,000 in federal and provincial LocalMotion funding for improved pathways to and from McClymount Park and residential areas.
An additional $45,000 in federal and provincial Towns for Tomorrow funding for the McClymount Park Fitness Portal project, which will see a 12-unit package of fixed outdoor equipment at the entrance to the park located near the Civic Centre. The variety of equipment to be installed includes a rowing machine, elliptical, chest press and air skier among others as well as four to six stations that are wheel chair accessible. It will be with interest to see how the items stand up to our legendary weather and our less than civic minded vandals.
Third Avenue will get some attention as well with $5,000 from the Trees for Tomorrow program to improve green areas at the entrance to the historical Sunken Gardens and tree replacement along the main street of the Business and shopping district.
The city will also received extra funding the form of $429,834 in Small Community Grants to support Prince Rupert in providing basic services; and $251,705 in Traffic Fine Revenue Sharing, as announced on March 23.
Prince Rupert also picks up some extra cash with $5,331 from the Climate Action Revenue Incentive Program coming our way.
While some of these announcements are simply recycling old announcements (see the traffic fine cash drop), others are new ideas that we hadn't heard much about before the April 6th announcement.
Part of the theme of these announcements across the province involve the creation of jobs in local communities as part of the funding process, Monday's announcement did not break down how many jobs would be created from the splurge of spending, nor how long any of those jobs may last.
It will be with interest that locals watch the projects develop and see if we are gaining a proper bang for our infrastructure bucks...
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