Feds launch $15 million program

September 09, 2009

Tillsonburg will be the base for a new Sand Plains Development Fund.

Ottawa officially launched its $15-million economic aid program for the sand plain counties on Friday, a combination of grants for non-profit organizations and loans for small businesses. The program office will be on the second floor of the Tillsonburg Town Centre.

First announced last summer, the program is intended to boost the economies of rural communities in Ontario hit by the downturn in the tobacco industry.

"We realized something needed to be done," Diane Finley, local MP and Canada's minister for human resources and skills development, said as she unveiled the program at the Delhi museum, which tells the history of tobacco growing. "Today we are delivering real action to help them."

Referring to the controversy and economic loss that followed tobacco's near-collapse in recent years, Finley said the program "will bring closure to a challenging situation we all have faced."

“We’re collectively satisfied this program is underway and will hopefully pay dividends to the local and regional economy,” said Tillsonburg Mayor Stephen Molnar.

Known as the Sand Plains Community Development Fund, it will make available $5 million a year over the next three years to applicants from Norfolk, Elgin, Oxford, Middlesex, and Brant counties.

In the first year, $3 million will be set aside for business loans, $1.2 - $1.3 million will be for non-profits while the remainder will cover "administrative costs," said Diana Jedig, executive director of the Ontario Association of Community Futures Development Corporations, which is helping to deliver the program.

Projects given funding must be completed by Mar. 31, 2012, she said. Applications will be processed within 60-90 days "at the most," she added.

Proposals most likely to get approval are those that will have an impact across the sand plain counties rather than in just one or two communities, officials said.

Who gets funding will be decided by a board. The board will in turn be advised by a steering committee made up of the five sand plain mayors.

Elgin-Middlesex-London MP Joe Preston was tasked with finding a way to help former tobacco communities last summer. He brought together area mayors to start discussions. Friday’s announcement was the end product of the committee’s work.

“First you get it right, and then you get it done,” Preston said. “It’s not about getting it done fast, it’s about helping the people you wanted to help.”

Preston was glad to see the applications were ready and the office was open for business on Friday.
Officials at the launch pointed out that the program's "priorities" match that of the South Central Ontario Region, the body the sand plain mayors sit on together.

Norfolk Mayor Dennis Travale, who chairs SCOR and will be on the steering committee, said municipal projects that cross county boundaries such as tourism initiatives, trails, and public transportation systems could be candidates for approval.

"We're hopeful that there's a number of good ideas out there," said John Klunder, who ran the provincially funded tobacco transition program three years ago and will head up this one as well out of an office in Tillsonburg.

Loan applications will be handled through the local business development offices in the five counties, such as the Norfolk Business Development Corporation on Queensway East in Simcoe.

Finley made the announcement in front of antique farm implements used decades ago in the growing of tobacco, a crop that once defined the area and brought prosperity to the five counties.

The tobacco industry is now less than one-tenth the size of its peak.

On hand were mayors from those communities as well as their MPs and officials from Agriculture Canada.

“We look forward to regionalized growth through the projects available,” Molnar said.

Molnar said he expects there will be no repeat of the last tobacco transition aid program that was funded by the province.
"I think we've learned not to provide substantive funding that misplaces another element," he said, referring to projects that ended up competing with established businesses.

Bob Speller, Liberal candidate in the next federal election, called Friday's announcement "too little, too late, too vague, and too spread out.

"There's 15 million over three years over five different counties. What impact can that really have?" Speller asked.
"There's much more work that needs to be done."
Speller noted the launch comes 13 months after the program was first announced as part of a $300 million buyout of tobacco quota. "Now she is re-announcing the same program just before another probable election," he said.

To find out more about the program and how to apply, go to www.sandplains.ca or www.ontcfdc.com or call 1-877-607-7263 (SAND).