As Guthrie Center moves into the next phases of its facade improvement project, there are other grant possibilities looming out there that would further help with the town’s revitalization.

Mayor Denny Kunkle says he currently has people working on an application for Guthrie Center  to be considered by the Iowa Economic Development Authority for its Main Street Iowa program.  Kunkle says the program would open up the door for many other building renovation and improvement projects within the town.

“When we you see the benefits of what can be gained through the Main Street program, we’d be foolish not to try to be a part of that.  There is just so many grant funds available out there that aren’t available to a community unless you’re in the Main Street program.  So that’s what our vision is and our focus is–is to try to get to there.”

Since the program’s inception in 1986, over $940 million private dollars have been invested in building rehabilitations and renovations in the 68 communities that are part of Main Street Iowa.

Kunkle says he has discussed the Main Street idea with many people in the community and they have been receptive to the possibilities it would bring.  However, it is a government-funded organization, and he says people need to understand that there are some rules and stipulations that come with being accepted.

“It’s a government program so there’s a certain amount of bologna that you have to put up with in order to take advantage.  The main thing that we have to stress to everybody is the Main Street program wants community involvement–they don’t want it to be a program that’s just being pushed by the city.  They want it to be driven by the public itself.  They want it to be driven by people in the community and have total community involvement.  They don’t just three or four people pushing the program and trying to do everything.  They look for a lot of community involvement from individuals.”

Kunkle says the Main Street application is due by the end of the year.  The mayor will address the public to further gauge their level of interest about the program during the town hall meeting scheduled for next Monday at 7pm.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

You may use these HTML tags and attributes:

<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>