Jeff Green | Aug 05, 2015


Late last week, Central and North Frontenac townships received word that they are the recipients of grants under the Canada 150 fund.

The largest grant will go to Central Frontenac. They will receive $110,000 towards a library and community centre in Mountain Grove.

“The vibrant and growing community of Mountain Grove will benefit greatly with a new community centre and library, and I am very happy that they received all the funding they requested,” said MP Scott Reid in a press release that came out on Friday, July 31.

The grant will not go towards a brand new building, said Central Frontenac Mayor Frances Smith, but rather to an addition to be built onto the township fire hall in Mountain Grove.

“We had planned to build a 1,000 square foot library branch, but it will likely need to be larger because of accessibility requirements in modern branches,” said Smith, who added that the township will be contacting the board of the Kingston Frontenac Public Library to talk about moving the Mountain Grove branch to a new space.

Among the good news for Central Frontenac is the potential cost savings that will come from closing down the building that currently houses the Mountain Grove branch. The branch is currently located in the former Township of Olden offices, which since they were vacated by the fire department several years ago, are not being used for any other purpose except storage of records. Reduced maintenance costs in the entire building will lead to savings in the municipal budget.

While the new library is not going to be a full-fledged community centre, “It will include meeting space for the public,” said Smith.

The other project that received funding in Frontenac County was the Snow Road Community Centre in North Frontenac. The funding of $23,000 will be combined with $41,000 in funding from the township and $7,000 that was raised locally to make up a $71,000 pool of money for a series of upgrades. The largest of these is the addition of a 15' x 25' vestibule at the front of the building, which will cost $45,000 to build, according to John Kittle of the Snow Road Community Centre .

Kittle worked with Cory Klatt from the township on the grant application, and said the users of the hall, which is now in used over 20 days a month for various events, will make good use of the new entrance and vestibule. The rest of the money will go towards an upgrade to the kitchen as well as a proper air conditioning system for the building.

The Snow Road Community Centre is located in a converted 19th century school house that served the community as a school for over 60 years. There are some current members of the Snow Road Community Centre who attended the original schoolhouse, back in the 1960s

“The integration of historic facilities with the modern community here in North Frontenac is one of the many things that make it such an interesting and wonderful place to live,” said Reid.

Although it was not part of the funding announced this week, the Snow Road Community Centre also announced they are planning a related project for the 150th anniversary of Canada in 2017.

“The community is planning to research, document and showcase the area's history with our heritage schoolhouse as the focal point,” said John Kittle.

The project has already been bolstered by locating a number of photographs from the early 1900s, when Snow Road was more of a commercial hub than it is now.

There are also seven people who use the center today who went to the Snow Road school, and the project will include interviews about their memories of their school days.

The Canada 150 grants were announced on Friday, just two days before the government was dissolved with the calling of an election on October 19. The grant application deadline was in early June. In Scott Reid's now former Lanark Frontenac Lennox and Addington (the new riding is Lanark Frontenac Kingston), grants were also given to projects in the communities of Smiths Falls, Carleton Place, the Town of Perth and Lanark Highlands.

The grant in Perth is going to The Table, a comprehensive community food centre. It will be used to enhance accessibility as well as other upgrades. The amount of The Table grant as well as information about the Lanark Highlands grant were not available this week from Scott Reid's office.  

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