The Marshall County Council members hosted a work session last week in order to gather more information on the proposed One Marshall County initiative.
Marshall County Crossroads Chairperson Ginny Munroe explained to those in attendance that it is the goal of the Crossroads committee to focus future efforts on paid staff to ensure that Marshall County continues on a path to bring in grant dollars to assist with projects in each community in the county. In order to accomplish that goal, there is a proposal that an executive director is hired, as well as a grant writer and a marketing and public relations person to continue to seek funding for projects in One Marshall County.
Munroe stated that 150 volunteers taking care of many aspects of growth in Marshall County would merge to these paid positions, while still answering to a board of directors and maintaining support from representatives from each community giving input on future projects that focus on Economic Development, Education and Workforce, Quality of Place, Housing and Infrastructure, and Quality of Life.
The cost to operate One Marshall County is about $250,000.
There were concerns presented by Bremen Town Attorney Tony Wagner and Argos Development Director Mark VanDerWeele about the lack of representation from those communities in recent meetings held by the Crossroads team. It was also expressed that officials from the Town of Bourbon held the same concern. Munroe said an invitation had been extended to those municipalities to be represented, but it appeared that a lack of communication led to confusion of lack of participation of the entities within the Marshall County Crossroads team.
Wagner said different answers were given to same questions about One Marshall County and filtering and handling money were great concerns.
Wagner also pointed to email conversations with Marshall County Economic Development Corporation Board President Bill Davis where clarification of READI grant applications and filtration of the projects. Bethany Hartley from the South Bend-Elkhart Regional Development Authority (RDA), of which Marshall County is represented, explained that applications are reviewed and all projects that are not deemed viable, those proposals will have further discussions to potentially move them through the process, but are discussed in a public meeting by the RDA and decisions are made in a public forum. If there a multiple communities with similar projects, they could be packaged together to optimize dollars. The funding will be distributed by the RDA.
Munroe clarified that Marshall County Crossroads/One Marshall County wants to service all of the communities in Marshall County going after regional funds.
There will be efforts to work together to move forward for better communication.
