Town of Raymond Council weigh value of SouthGrow’s new Grants Advising Program

Posted on July 16, 2024 by admin

By Heather Cameron
For Southern Alberta Newspapers

During the Town of Raymond Council meeting that took place on July 2, Councillor Matt Evans spoke about the 2024 SouthGrow Grants Advising Program.

SouthGrow, Councillor Evans explained, does Economic Development stuff for the whole region, and one of the ways that they are looking to add value is this Graints Advising Program for an committees or organizations.

“They have access to this like mega database wherer they can search for grants,” said Councillor Evans. “They’ll say ‘here’s the type of grants you can apply and here’s how you do it.’ They won\t write the grant for the people, but they’ll discuss what they need to do, and they’ll even look over it.”

The program, Councillor Evans stated, is free to communities who are part of SouthGrow.

“They’re kind of phasing out funding for these organizations, for these REDA’s (Regional Economic Development Alliance), which is super unfortunate,” said Councillor Evans. “They are basically shifting funding from rural to urban for formula where they give less and less requiring more community contributions or income generated by the REDA’s. One of the ways that they’re exploring to fund that is to start a Destination Management Organization (DMO). My understanding is we used to be part of the Badlands DMO and then they wrapped that up and we basically just took our money we were given to Badlands and shifted it over to SouthGrow.”

Councillor Evans explained to the rest of Council that Laurie Lyckman, Vice-Chairperson for  SouthGrow Regional Initiative and Councillor for Vulcan County, reached out to the Town of Raymond via a letter, as they are a member of SouthGrow and explained more about the DMO’s via a letter.

“Tourism is a strong economic driver and when delivered in an organized regional approach to create jobs, strengthen the local economy, and contribute to local infrastructure development,” said Lyckman’s letter.

Canadian Badlands, Lyckman’s letter explains, was the Destination Management Organization (DMO) for many of the municipalities in the SouthGrow area, but with the Canadian Badlands DMO dissolving, municipalities now have nowhere to turn for assistance with their tourism needs.

“As many municipalities are not able to afford a dedicated tourism employee, SouthGrow is  investigating the possibility of expanding its operations to assist with tourism in our region,” said Lyckman’s letter. 

“SouthGrow has the capacity to diversify its portfolio and manage a regional DMO. By doing so,  they would have the opportunity to apply for funds through Travel Alberta, create a Tourism inventory list, market attractions, showcase local events through a regional calendar, and more.”

Lyckman’s letter concluded by inviting the Town of Raymond to complete a short survey regarding the potential for a regional DMO managed by SouthGrow that was attached to the letter and also invited the Town to contact her if they needed more information.

Council did express concern about if this was to replace SouthGrow as a Regional Economic 

Development Alliance, but Councillor Evans stated that it was just to add additional value so there are additional funding dollars available to help fill the gap.

“They would still effectively provide the REDA function and the DMO function and SouthGrow is  working hard to generate some income outside of municipal funding,” said Councillor Evans. 

SouthGrow, Councillor Evans says, is concerned about partnering with tons of businesses, as  that’s when they lose their focus on supporting communities and it switches to supporting  businesses. 

“It’s a challenging balance they have to keep,” said Councillor Evans. “SouthGrow is great; they really are doing a lot of good.”

Councillor Evans also invited the rest of Council to complete the short survey regarding the potential for a regional DMO managed by SouthGrow within the next couple of weeks.