LAHARPE — LaHarpe was left on the outside looking in, City Council members were told Wednesday, on a series of Community Development Block Grants announced recently by the Kansas Department of Commerce.
The city had applied for up to $400,000 in grant funding to help fund electric service upgrades.
The margin was apparently razor-thin, Mayor Mae Crowell explained, with 11 communities or counties receiving Community Facility Awards.
According to Crowell, recipients were chosen based on a point system that considers everything from community wealth, type of project under consideration and community participation. LaHarpe was 12th on the list, 1.8 points below the lowest point-receiver among the winning communities.
Council members said they planned to reapply for grant funding this fall.
For now, the city will continue to do some upgrades, but is limited by what’s in the bank, Crowell said.
Had the grant been approved, LaHarpe would have generated as much as $400,000 locally through the use of bonds to be paid over time.
Last summer, engineers gave the city a list of upgrades, with a full-scale project costing in excess of $725,000.
There was some thought to using bonds for the upgrades, even without the CDBG revenue, but the payoff rate would have been too expensive, the Council agreed.
Crowell noted the city had been lax in recent months in doing upgrades as it waited to learn whether the grant would be successful.
Local leaders will meet with KDOC advisers to determine how the city should adjust its upcoming application to ensure its success in 2017.
