Emily Plihal
Local Journalism
Initiative Reporter
Final allocation of Council Grants to Organizations in Peace River was made at the Town of Peace River’s regular meeting Oct. 6.
“There were four applicants for this intake period,” says director Community Service Tanya Bell during the meeting.
“The 2025 budget has been expended to the amount of $44,280 with a total budget of $50,000.”
Administration conducted a review of the four applicants; Peace River Art Club ($6,000), Miserable Miles ($5,000), Northern Lites Speed Skating Club ($956.40), and Town of Peace River Library ($500). The score administration calculated was provided to council to make its decision, if they chose, based on scoring.
“Any time we do an evaluation in any of our grant programs, we tend to award the highest ranked applications,” explains Bell of their scoring system.
“The rationale is they met the mark, whatever the criteria is,” she adds. “Typically, you would always award to your highest-ranking applicant. Essentially funding the top two covers your budget.”
Town administration offered Option 1 funding Miserable Miles at $5,000 and Northern Lites Speed Skating at $956.40, Option 2, providing full funding to the highest scored applicants and partial funding to the two other applicants, or Option 3 of council providing different direction to allocating funds.
In the end, council unanimously allocated $3,563.60 to Miserable Miles, $1,000 to Peace River Art Club, $956.40 to Northern Lites Speed Skating, and $200 to the library.
This will be the final intake of the Council Grants to Organizations for 2025, with a year-end of Dec. 31.