Councillors here are hoping to make the Harriston seniors centre more accessible.
Councillors recently endorsed an application for a federal Small Projects Accessibilities grant.
Mayor David Anderson said “It’s an accessibility grant, obviously, and it was just brought to the attention of the County of Wellington 10 days ago (prior to the April 29 Minto meeting).
“One of the downsides to it is that when grant applications of this kind come forth, 10 days is not a lot of time to put an application together. It puts a lot of hardship on municipalities to scramble to put something together.”
He said that in Wellington, the county and each municipality could have applied for a $50,000 grant. “If there had been enough time, we could have gotten $400,000 of funding for accessibility in Wellington County.”
Instead, he said, everyone is scrambling getting budgets together along with other items which need to be dealt with.
“It’s appreciated this funding is available. My only word to the upper level of government is that this municipality cannot work that quickly and we know very well that they don’t work that quickly.”
He said he would appreciate more time next time.
Treasurer Gord Duff noted the short deadline issue is not just about council and staff, but anyone the municipality needs to deal with to create the applications.
Duff said there were several other projects under consideration, but the contractors were unable to provide the turnaround of information in that short period of time. At the seniors’ centre the intent is to preserve the heritage features as well. He said this is still a 25-page application form.
Anderson said there may be more accessibility grants available later this year.
“The intent is not only to have communities physically accessible, but through communications as well.”
