Displaced Mine Employee Grant Programs
What is fostering progress?
Internal Initiative and Flexibility were Keys to Success
The Displaced Mine Employee Grant Program is a terrific example of internal initiative on the part of the US Forest Service. Individuals in the Northeastern Area State and Private Forestry Program recognized they could serve a need in the greater Biwabik area of Minnesota and helped connect funds to people in need. Krantz helped bridge a gap when Dane called to speak about grant opportunities. At the time, Dane was not aware of the $30,000 in funds available to implement a forest-based enterprise grant program. When Krantz and Dane collaborated on this project, the flexibility of the program development and implementation made it easy to get resources to individuals in need.
Local Administration. One of the reasons that the US Forest Service and the City of Biwabik were able to administer the grant program so easily was because the City did not require that any of the grant money be used to cover the City’s administrative expenses. Quite often, an administering agency requires a significant portion of a grant to cover overhead. With the initial funding only $30,000, Dane commented, “There’s no sense in taking money from people who actually need it to be employed independently.”
Delivery of Funds to Grantees. Many grants are disbursed using a reimbursement scheme, (i.e. the administering agency distributes funds to grant recipients and then puts in a request to a funder for reimbursement). In this case, the City was not comfortable using this funding option because they were serving over a dozen different communities within the local area. The Forest Service recognized this challenge and facilitated the disbursement by providing the money upfront. The City was then able to put the funds into a dedicated account and write checks directly to the participants. This flexibility made a tremendous difference, with minimal lag time between the mine closure and fund dispersal. The entire process, from the mine closure to the final grant award process, was only 3-4 months.
External Selection Process. Establishing an external selection process took a lot of pressure off local administrative staff. Minnesota DNR and USFS personnel reviewed applications to determine if the proposed projects met the forest-based industry participation involvement standard. Dane related, “I know a lot of people and have relatives in the community too. I didn’t want there to be any perception of impropriety.”
This site was developed by the Ecosystem Management Initiative through a partnership with the US Forest Service and the US Department of Interior. Read more.
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