Several regional cities and towns including four from Porter County have shown preliminary interest in banding together to hire a $60,000 consultant to identify, pursue and position them to receive federal funding for local projects.

Time is of the essence, their representatives were told.

Guidelines are being formulated now to disburse federal stimulus money through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act; funding through other sources is available as well.

Valparaiso Mayor Jon Costas, Burns Harbor Town Council member Cliff Fleming and officials from Beverly Shores and Hebron were among those indicating tentative support for joint hiring of a consultant.

Under one scenario Valparaiso would pay $1,631; Burns Harbor $127; Beverly Shores $405 and Hebron $158 but those figures anticipate full participation by all 49 municipalities and three counties in Northwest Indiana.

Also showing interest are Dyer, Griffith, Schererville, Hobart, Highland and Crown Point in Lake County, and Michigan City in LaPorte County.

No one was introduced as representing Chesterton or Porter at a Thursday meeting in Portage at the offices of the Northwestern Indiana Regional Planning Commission.

Griffith Town Council member George Jerome said those wanting the services of a consultant need to act now. “We’d be missing the boat if we don’t do it, and do it quickly.”

May 1 was set as the deadline to express an intent to participate.

As tentatively proposed, the Northwest Indiana Forum Inc. would enter into a $60,000 contract with B&D Consulting of Washington D.C. and undertake a public/private partnership with the municipalities.

Those communities and counties participating under that contract would divide its cost between them and enter into an interlocal cooperation agreement.

The respective governing bodies in each municipality would have to approve the interlocal agreement and in most cases the assessment. Highland Clerk-treasurer Michael Griffin offered to serve as fiscal officer to accept, administer and disburse the funds.

Griffin said a committee of the whole or separate committees could be formed to authorize spending and accept the grant applications. How the latter would be ranked to determine who gets funding has yet to be determined. “Those are things we need to learn as we go along.”

Griffin proposed using road mileage reported to NIRPC as a way to allocate shares of the $60,000 fee, but another formula could be adopted, he said.

Forum president/CEO Vince Galbiati and others stressed that participation in the partnership doesn’t carry any guarantees. “There is risk you may not receive something that will directly benefit your community but the region.”

Griffin and Galbiati emphasized that nothing a community or county does under the B&D Consulting contract should deter it from seeking other funding avenues on its own, or interfere with grant requests now pending through NIRPC.

If the participating municipalities are serious about moving forward, Galbiati said they’ll need to get their act together in 30 to 60 days to maximize the funding possibilities available.

Tentative plans are that each municipality submit one or two projects for consideration. The level of detail needed for submission, and whether money would be funded for planning/engineering for a project, were discussed.

Several representatives present cited the need to address serious flooding in the region.

Posted 4/24/2009