Commissioners ask county staff to continue reviewing grant applications
Kyle McCabe/Summit Daily News
At a Nov. 25 work session, the Summit Board of County Commissioners gave county staff direction regarding 2026 grant applications.
The Summit County Government Grant Program received a remodeling for the 2026 cycle with a new schedule based on similar grant programs provided by towns. Applications closed Nov. 21, and executive administrative manager Caitlin Johnson presented to the board about the applications the county received.
Johnson said a committee reviewed the grant applications and made recommendations, which included scores for the quality of the applications and suggested awards. Commissioner Tamara Pogue expressed concerns with the recommended amounts, suggesting some low-scoring projects recommended to receive small amounts be cut completely and some high-schoring projects receive more than recommended.
“When you don’t fully fund a grant, and we take a strategy where we’re partially funding a lot of organizations, that may put the nonprofit in a position where they can’t actually fund the program they were asking money for,” Pogue said.
Pogue also said some applications could be eligible for grant funding through the county’s Strong Future fund. She asked if staff could work to get those applications funded through Strong Future so that more county government grant program money would be available to more fully fund the other projects.
Staff recommended spending $500,000 on the grants in 2026 with $400,000 being allotted in the first round and $100,000 being allotted six months later. Pogue suggested only doing the first round and using the $100,000 to “fill in” some of the applications that received high scores but recommendations of partial funding.
The commissioners agreed to give county staff direction to review the grant applications again, looking for ones that could qualify for other funding sources like Strong Future and focusing on fully funding applications from smaller nonprofits that might need the full funding to be able to undertake their project at all.
The board will review the applications again at a future meeting.
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