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| Rice County receives $30 million in stimulus dollars |
By: SUZANNE ROOK, Managing Editor
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Posted: Friday, December 25, 2009 5:50 pm
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President Obama’s plan to pull the nation out of its recession by pumping billions into projects that create and save jobs and spur the economy has poured about $30 million into Rice County, according to the independent investigative reporting newsroom, ProPublica.
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, signed by Obama in February, approved $787 billion in loans, grants and tax cuts. Of that, ProPublica reported this week, $305 billion has been spent; $93 billion in tax cuts have been issued.
The online newsroom’s stimulus tracker — at propublica.com — “added thousands of records the feds didn’t include — the law doesn’t require all recipients to report to Recovery.gov — to create the most comprehensive publicly available analysis of stimulus spending that we know of.”
According to the tracker, the largest single grant in the county — $4.7 million — will pay for road improvements to the entrance ramp from I-35 to County Road 48, about a mile north of Hwy. 21 in Faribault. More than $18.6 million in single-family home loans has reportedly been awarded to eligible rural Rice County residents who are unable to secure a conventional loan through the USDA.
And while the city of Faribault has thrice been awarded stimulus money, the city of Northfield has so far come up short.
Education
Northfield’s two colleges have taken a large hunk of the local stimulus pie, according ProPublica’s tracker.
St. Olaf College has been awarded $1.4 million for several research studies and another $468,000 in student Pell Grants. While Pell Grants go directly to students, St. Olaf spokesman David Gonnerman said, the research dollars were money the school typically receives from another federal funding source. This year, though, stimulus money was used for the grants which came through the National Science Foundation and Department of Education.
Carleton College has gotten a $52,000 grant for a federal work-study program and $540,000 in Pell Grants for students.
Business loans
Rice County businesses have so far been awarded loans totaling $3.94 million. The largest loan — $1.5 million — went to Aurora Pharmaceuticals, affiliated with Cannon River Veterinary Clinic, which is developing pharmaceuticals for the swine industry.
Two new Northfield businesses — downtown’s Fit To Be Tri’d and the under construction Kentucky Fried Chicken got Small Business Administration loans of $818,000 and $45,000 respectively. Northfield Urgent Care, which opened this spring, and ServiceMaster, both received similar loans using stimulus funds, ProPublica reported.
Homelessness
Northfield’s Community Action Center this month received a $150,000 federal stimulus grant for homelessness prevention and rapid re-housing.
CAC Administrative Director Kathy Bjerke said the funds, available through October 2011, will go toward housing location, lease subsidies, back rent, utility payments, moving costs and deposits for those who are or will soon be homeless.
Cities
So far, the city of Northfield has been shut out when it comes to the stimulus.
This summer it lost out on a $472,000 request for community police officers and failed to meet qualifications to apply for help with a proposed city-wide fiber optic network. Even before that, it got short shrift.
The Housing & Redevelopment Authority in March was told it had $800,000 to split between itself, Lonsdale and Faribault to purchase and rehab foreclosed homes. But even before the HRA could make plans, the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency, which allotted the funds, gave the entire $800,000 to Faribault.
Peter Waldock, Faribault Community Development Director, said the money would purchase up to eight homes, some which it may rent. The money, Waldock said in March, may also be used for home buyer assistance for those in the low- to moderate-income bracket.
Faribault’s also gotten two Department of Justice grants as part of NRRA.
The department will share the funds with the Rice County Sheriff’s Office, said Faribault Police Chief Dan Collins. The grants — for $51,851 and $12,604 — were accepted Oct. 28. The larger grant will be used to purchase equipment and to pay overtime for the Rice County Drug Task Force.
“We thought it would be a good use of the money,” Collins said. And it came easy.
The government “e-mailed me and said the money was available; I just had to apply for it,” he said.
The smaller award will help finance a digital video camera for a sheriff’s office squad car, as well as purchase new rifles for the city’s squads. The funds aren’t in-hand, said Collins; the city will be reimbursed once it submits the proper paperwork.
City Administrator Joel Walinski hopes Northfield has gone without long enough.
Four stimulus requests remain in the pipeline. The city has asked for funding for a new fire truck, turn out gear for the city’s fire fighters, transit improvements and energy-efficient windows for the aging City Hall.
Walinski said he expects to hear back about each of the requests within the next three months.
Until then, he’s keeping his fingers crossed.
FUNDS TO BUSINESSES
Company — City — Loan
Aurora Pharmaceutical — Northfield — $1.5 million
Fit To Be Tri’d — Northfield — $45,000
Kentucky Fried Chicken — Northfield — $818,000
Northfield Urgent Care — Northfield — $533,000
ServiceMaster — Northfield — $630,000
Jimmy John’s sandwiches — Faribault — $112,500
Lux Hospitality — Faribault — $213,000
Coastwise Fireguard — Webster — $90,000
— ProPublica stimulus tracker
— Kay Fate contributed to this report. Suzanne Rook is the managing editor. She can be reached at srook@northfieldnews.com or 645-1113.
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Amazing that supposed stimulous funds successes are claims of what appears to be for projects that would have happened anyways.
Your article forgot to mention the dozens and dozens of Rice County workers who were given jobs by the the US Census Bureau for preparations for the 2010 Census during Mar-May and Sept-Oct pay periods and many will be re-employed during April-June to track down all the people who do not respond by April 1st with their Census questionnaires.
So we are getting back some of our money that had been taken in federal taxes?
Or is it just another loan from China or one additional shift of the printing press?
Amazing how this is being touted as an achievement and completely ignores the reality.
Kay you need to do a bit more digging..which is a long lost art in journalism.
The colleges get another 2 million that our children will have to pay back with interest from this so-called stimulus? Where's the outrage that this would be 'stimulus' spending?
It's bad enough that an average 4-year degree at these colleges can put a student in debt around a quarter of million dollars! When will our local colleges care about children and work to lower the burden they place on our children and their families?
Throwing a couple of million dollars more their way for so-called stimulus spending will not teach these fine instituations to be responsible.