BY GAIL CRABTREE
Owner, Dairy Queen

There seems to be a lot of erroneous information out there in regard to the grant we are seeking to aid in a rebuild.

We hope you can help us to spread the true facts.

We are seeking a grant sponsored by the Village of Canton and funded through the Community Development Block Grant Program. This is a federally funded program with $50 million available to qualifying projects. Our grant will be earmarked to help us purchase equipment only.

The amount of the grant, $195,000, is based upon the number of full time equivalent jobs that we will add to the community. The total cost of our rebuild project is close to $1,000,000.

The project will also be funded by all of the insurance proceeds, a bank loan, and personal assets. We will be open year round and expect to add 25-30 new jobs to support low to middle income families. Our business has supported the community for over 50 years and we want to see it continue to grow and prosper.

We are experiencing some pushback from individuals in the community who don’t fully understand all aspects of the grant process/purpose.

By you putting the facts out there we hope the people will show their support by emailing the Director of Economic Development, Leigh Rodriguez, LRodriguez@CantonNY.Gov