The Bridgeport News

by Jeff Toquinto, NEWS EDITOR

BRIDGEPORT (Thursday, September 5, 2002)

Members of Bridgeport’s City Council held a special meeting Tuesday evening to give approval to a grant application.

The voting was a formality, according to City Manager Kim Haws.

However, the application is part of a process for a Governor’s Community Partnership Grant. The grant application is for $80,000 and will be used in the city’s quest to acquire more than $1.3 million in EDA funds. The city is teaming up with Region VI Planning and Development Council in hopes to acquire the funding.

Haws said the money will be used as an additional match for the EDA funds the city has been seeking for several months. Haws and several other Bridgeport officials had been optimistic the EDA funding would be approved shortly after it received regional EDA approval. The city’s application, said Haws, is currently being reviewed at the federal level.


If approved the city would use the funds for additional infrastructure at the Charles Pointe site. The grant money is one of several avenues the city has looked at to help move the proposed $750 million development along Interstate 79 from conception to actual buildings.

Haws said the reason the city scheduled the special session Tuesday night was to try and facilitate the process as quickly as possible.

"We’re behind the eight ball with this EDA grant," said Haws. "Even though we’re still comfortable with our EDA grant application, it’s become a somewhat frustrating situation for us. We hope this will work out and take care of everything that is needed from a funding standpoint."