Graham Jaehnig/Daily Mining Gazette Julia Peterson, the Nature Conservancy of Michigan’s Keweenaw Heartlands project manager, talked with Keweenaw County Board during the Aug. Regular Meeting about a Letter of Intent to apply for a $50,000 Rural Readiness reimbursement grant through MDARD. The LOI, she said, is the first step toward applying for the grant.

EAGLE RIVER — The Keweenaw County Board unanimously approved a request for approval to submit a Letter of Intent (LOI) to apply for a Rural Readiness Grant through the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (MDARD). The request came from Julia Petersen, project manager of the Keweenaw Heartlands, the Nature Conservancy of Michigan.

The LOI is not an application for the grant.

“The purpose of the grant is to provide opportunities for rural areas to prepare for longer term solutions, future investment or future larger-scale funding opportunities,” Peterson said, “and essentially to increase overall readiness of rural areas.”

Peterson told the Board that the purpose of the LOI is two-fold:

Outline the the intent of the county and its partners to conduct a robust planning process for: A physical location for law enforcement, fire, first responder, and search and rescue training: storage of emergency equipment and vehicles; and third, staging area for response to large-scale emergencies such as public health or mass power outage.

Demonstrate the need for this type of building and capability in the county, including a description of current capacity and challenges related to emergency services.

“The Nature Conservancy in Michigan is willing to provide staff time through my role, to support writing the Letter of Intent if the county chooses to move forward,” said Petersen,” and then if MDARD approves the Letter of Intent, to support the application process as well.”

Board Vice Chairman Del Rajala asked if the application is granted, will the County still have a voice in the planning moving forward. Petersen responded yes, adding that in regards to the LOI, she recommends requesting the County’s partners to review the LOI, to provide them the opportunity to offer feedback or withdraw from the partner list. Another avenue of approach the County could use would be designate someone to review the LOI and circulate amongst the stakeholders, as long as the LOI meets the deadline of 3 p.m. on August 31, 2023.

“We just have to meet the deadline of August 31, said Petersen.”

“If MDARD selects the project and invites the county to apply for the grant,” Peterson said, “the next step would be to write a more in-depth grant application.”

That application would be due by Nov. 22.