Lee Rhodes, administer of the local hospital, joined the Horizon program. As a small community hospital that has economical hardship they where looking for tools to help their facility. A healthy hospital is a vital part of a Healthy Community.
Paul taught a class on serving on local government boards, districts and commisions. His day long presentation saw representatives from the the county, schools, city, conservation district, library board and various other groups.
The Community Library has been struggling for years to save enough funds to put in an electric door for the handicap patrons. Even though the Library is one level, the manuel door has been a major problem for wheel chair access. After one patron got a wheelchair stuck in the door frame and had to be manually pulled out by the Librian, the Library Board decided to put their used book sale money towards buying and wiring a new door. They found this to be a very slow and frustrating process. The Board then approached the three government entities (County, City, School) that fund the Library to see if they could help. Due to fiscal constraints, none of the entities had funds for the project. The Board then decided to look into grants to boost their meager savings. Two members of the Library Board attended the Mike Vogel grant workshop through the Horizons Program. They then pursued some of the resources given to them through Mike and another Grant attendee that had knowledge for handicap access. The Friends of the Library offered to help with the project as well. All this networking brought about a successful grant application to fund the new Library door, which will be installed this summer.
The Roundup Memorial Hospital and Medical Center has developed a grant committee to assist with ongoing needs of the facility. Two employees from the hospital attended a grant writing workshop that was held in Roundup. This workshop inspired the formation of the grant writing committee. The committee consists of staff, administration, and hospital board members.
The group has already submitted a proposal for a new autoclave. The existing autoclave is 60 years old. The committee is currently working on several other proposals as well.
Sarah Earwood, the chair of the committee, stated “we know that we can not run a hospital on grant funds alone, but anything we can do to improve the facility and the quality of service provided to the patients will have a huge impact to the community.”
A grant writing workshop was identified as a need through the Horizons program. MSU Extension and the Horizon program brought Mike Vogel to teach the all day class.
Mike Vogel was a guest in Roundup to present a work shop on grant writing through the fiscal support of Horizons. Again, the city, county, schools, library, hospital and other groups were present to learn how to write effective grant applications. Mike did an overview of grant language, avoiding review process pitfalls, potential grant sources and grant accoutablity. Numerous groups left armed with the knowledge and ability to pursue grants/funds to enhance and/or fund projects that otherwise would not happen.
Paul taught a class on serving on local government boards, districts and commisions. His day long presentation saw representatives from the the county, schools, city, conservation district, library board and various other groups. Attendees left with a better understanding of open meeting law, codes of ethics and parliamentary procedure practices. They also participated in a question and answer forum. Many of these participants take their new hand book with them to reference during their meetings and have commented that they feel better equiped to manage their duties during their meetings.