Dorchester Times: More Grants Available For Community Development

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

More Grants Available For Community Development

It has been brought to the attention of the Times that there are a few more grants now available for Dorchester leaders mulling community improvement projects.

Community Development Assistance Act: The CDAA grant was created by the Nebraska Legislature to encourage financial support by businesses to community betterment organizations in their efforts to implement community service and development projects in economically distressed areas. CDAA empowers the Department of Economic Development to distribute a 40% state tax credit to businesses, corporations, insurance firms or financial institutions or individuals that make eligible contributions of cash, services or materials to approved community betterment projects. An applicant must be a village, city or county government; or a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization. No more than $25,000 in state tax credits can be approved per project. For information and application, contact: Kevin Andersen at the Nebraska Department of Economic Development at (402) 471-3775 or kevin.s.andersen@nebraska.gov.

Tree Planting and Landscape Grants: The 2009 Trees for Nebraska Towns grant program, part of the ReTree Nebraska initiative, provides nearly $300,000 in grant funding to help with tree planting and associated landscaping in communities across Nebraska. Application forms are available at http://arboretum.unl.edu/community.html. Projects must be on public or non-profit property and provide direct public benefit. A 50% funding match is required; this required match can include donated and in-kind goods and services. Application deadline is July 31. Contact the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum at (402) 472-2971 or jevertson1@unl.edu.

2 comments:

AnonymousJuly 22, 2009 at 6:13 AM
todays story in the lincoln journal star, well there is some federal grant money that didn't come to Dorchester, because nobody probly did anything. This grant money is going for streets, sewers, and water wells. Not to Dorchester though where we have people that won't get off their bottoms and improve our town.

http://www.journalstar.com/news/nebraska/doc4a65cf7ab9cb5870238060.txt
ReplyDelete
Replies
AnonymousJuly 22, 2009 at 10:09 AM
Not just totally grant, there is a match required. Also some income qualification guidelines need to be met, but I agree, infrastructure improvement is always something to look into.

(Plus certain water projects would require the installation of individual water meters, no more flat fees for water usage...Pay for what you use.)
ReplyDelete
Replies

Add comment

Village Dweller checks all reader comments to determine if they are appropriate for print.

Dorchester: A Good Little Family Town

Dorchester, Nebraska (est. population 630) is located in northern Saline county. Close in proximity to Interstate 80, Dorchester is only 25 minutes from the state capital of Lincoln (est. population 250,000) and about 55 minutes from Omaha (metro population 725,000).

Dorchester's median resident age is 37 years. In 2005, Dorchester had a median family income of approximately $35,600. The median house value was about $63,000. About 95 percent of Dorchester residents commute to work via Interstate and highways.

The village has a quality public school, which received a $4.1 million expansion and modernization in 2008; it offers a small classrooms and individualized attention. Total enrollment of grades K-12 is around 230-250 students.

Ancestries of the Dorchester area are primarily German (42.4%), Czech (24.9%), Irish (12.5%), English (5.4%), and Dutch (4.9%).

Dorchester Historical Facts

* On July 4, 1871, the railroad reached Dorchester.
* Incorporated in 1881, Dorchester's population grew from 200 to 500 by 1882.
* In 1882, Dorchester had 90 buildings, 35 of which were businesses or public facilities. Brick buildings lined both sides of Washington Avenue for two blocks.
* Dorchester's longest-running newspaper was The Dorchester Star, which was published until the late 1940s.
* By 1889, Dorchester's population is said to have reached 800, while the town housed an opera house, a two-story brick schoolhouse with a bell tower, and four churches.
* By the 1910s, Dorchester had electricity, a water tower and a fire department.
* Dorchester's main arteries, Highways 6 and 33, were graveled in the 1940s.
* Dorchester's first irrigation well was drilled on Chris Weber's farm and rural electrification was finished following WWII.

A Village with History

Dorchester is one of the "alphabet towns" on the Burlington & Missouri River Railroad line built west from Lincoln. The town site was selected for its pleasant location in the northern part of Saline County, about eight miles west of Crete. This situation is an attractive one, being on the level prairie land, midway between the West Blue River and Turkey Creek. The first named stream is three miles north, and the latter about the same distance south from the town. Dorchester was platted in 1870 and incorporated in 1881. The name "Dorchester" came from either for a suburb of Boston by that name or a town in England. No one is sure. Two of the very first settlers were James Seely and Edward McIntyre, who both made Dorchester their permanent home.

Dorchester: In The Beginning

Here is a look at Dorchester around 1890, less than a decade after its official incorporation, as documented by Andreas' History of the State of Nebraska:
* POPULATION: "About 300, and is made up of a substantial and progressive class of citizens, who are moral and industrious. ... The town grew but very little until the year 1879, for the reason that Pleasant Hill, on Turkey Creek, a short distance south, was the county seat and naturally drew a trade for quite a large scope of country."
* BUSINESS: "The business and professional interests of the town are represented by three general merchandise stores, two drug, one grocery, one furniture, two hardware, and two millinery stores, one bank, two restaurants, two hotels, three livery stables, a post office, one newspaper office, two elevators, two lumber yards, two coal yards, two blacksmith shops, two lawyers and four physicians."
* SCHOOL: "The schoolhouse is a good one. The schoolhouse was built in 1872, since which time the public schools have been continually kept up. The present schoolhouse is 24' x 40' in size, two stories high. The school is graded and consists of three departments. The house is found too small, and arrangements will soon be made to increase its size."
* CHURCHES: "There are three substantial churches."
* HOMES: "The residence portion of the village is made up of neat houses of different styles of architecture, but none of them very large."
* NEWSPAPER: "The Dorchester Star, which was established August 21, 1881, by H. C. Bittenbender, who edited it until January 19, 1882, when he sold it to Ryerson & Bullock, the present proprietors. The Star is a bright weekly paper, five-column quarto, in size, and is Republican in politics."