The Kemmerer Recreation Center is hoping to get funding for several projects by applying for grants with the Wyoming Community Foundation.

Kemmerer Recreation and Events Department Director Rachelle Points said that the funding is held by the state, but a local board here in Kemmerer makes the decisions on how to invest the money from the Wyoming Community Foundation.

“This year we’re asking for everything,” Points said. “They can always say no, but it’s not easy to re-ask for this year.”

The Kemmerer Rec Center opened in 1985 and is in need of some updates.

The center did just install new bleachers using funding from a Lincoln County Recreation Commission Grant. The bleachers tripled the amount of seating in the rec center.

Points said the department is asking for $35,000 in operational costs from the Wyoming Community Foundation’s local board.

“In the past years they’ve asked for $25,000,” Points said. “The Community Foundation has always funded those costs ever since we opened.”

Besides the basic operational costs, Points said the rec center is really focusing on asking for money to pay for project estimates.

“We need to get people to come and tell us how much money we’re really in for,” Points said.

Points said they want to estimate how much it would take to renovate the sauna and whirlpool room.

In addition to the rec center improvements, Points said the grant funding would help with improvements to the golf course and the city pool.

“Our golf carts are 12 years old, and we want to upgrade five of those carts,” Points said.

A splash pad at the pool is another project the recreation department is hoping to fund.

“Instead of fixing the leak in the kiddy pool, we could transform it into a splash pad, because all of the water and treatment systems are already there,” Points said at a council meeting last month.

The rec center is also looking to replace the floor in the weight and cycling rooms.

“The floors were originally for a racquetball court,” Points said. “They’ve been damaged by people dropping the weights, and so we want to put concrete in there, because I really don’t see us going back to a racquetball court.”

Points said the rec center has plans for updated and renovated storage spaces.

“Our little storage shed by the center is really deteriorating,” Points said. “We want a cement pad and a new storage space.”

If the department received the grant funding, money would probably be received in March of 2018, according to Points.

“We would then have to finish the grant projects within the 2018 / 2019 budget —  it’s a use it or lose it situation,” Points said.

Kemmerer City Administrator Andrew Nelson applauded Points’ efforts to secure funding for these projects.

“With the county working on proposing projects using revenue from a sixth penny tax, those projects, like roads, can’t be funded any other way,” Nelson said. “These grants are one of those other options that can fund these softer projects.”

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