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Brentwood Press - AntiochPress_05.09.08 - Index

4A | THEPRESS.NET COMMUNITY MAY 9, 2008
City dispenses funds
to social service groups
by Dave Roberts
Staff Writer
Every year, the City Council gets
to play Santa Claus, doling out thousands
of dollars to social service organizations
that help the needy. And every
year, council members say it’s one of
their hardest jobs, leading to sleepless
nights because they can’t meet all of the
funding requests.
“This is probably one of the toughest
processes I’ve ever been through in
my life,” said Councilman Reggie Moore
at the April 22 council meeting. “There
were no undeserving applicants in this
process. I have never been through a
process that was so stressful.
About $2.3 million was available
from federal Community Development
Block Grants and Antioch Development
Agency funds. The bulk of it went
toward city and county programs.
The county received $800,000 for
neighborhood preservation and rental
rehabilitation programs. Antioch received
nearly $900,000 for downtown
roads and sidewalks, handicap ramps,
handicap-accessible doors at the police
and public works departments, re-roofing
the Bedford Center and video surveillance
cameras.
Much of the discussion at the meeting
focused on much smaller amounts
that were divided among about twodozen
social service organizations. The
biggest winner was Opportunity Junction,
a job training and placement organization
that received $120,000.
For a while it looked like the biggest
loser would be The Positive Edge,
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which supplies business clothing for
men and women seeking to get back
into the job market. WW Ministries
Inc., which runs the program, asked the
council for $16,700.
But a council subcommittee of
Brian Kalinowski and Reggie Moore
recommended zero funding, despite the
city having funded the business clothing
program in past years.
Kalinowski said he based his funding
decisions on whether the organization
helped youth, seniors and victims
of violent crime. Moore said he preferred
to allocate money to a program
that hadn’t previously been funded by
the city, which helps males 16 and older
who are fathers or about to become fathers.
The council agreed to provide
$10,000 for Positive Edge by taking it
from a fund for unspecifi ed city economic
development projects and giving
it to Opportunity Junction to use
to contract with Positive Edge for that
amount of clothing supply services.
The Proud Fathers Program, which
is run by the Family Stress Center, was
given $7,000. Moore said the program
could benefi t the whole community, not
just the young fathers that it’s aimed at.
“As we know in our communities
today, a lot of young men who don’t
have fathers have a very diffi cult time
in learning the concepts and skills that
it takes to become a really good dad,”
said Moore. “With the current levels of
youth violence that we have seen in our
community, I felt that this was a project
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Going home
Photo courtesy of Cliff Rezentes
Tom Herrington, a homeless man who had been living in the Antioch
area since November, got on a bus Monday to return to
his family in Houston, Texas. “His sister Penny is expecting him
and is planning to help get him back on his feet,” said Antioch Police
Offi cer Cliff Rezentes, who obtained a donation from the Salvation
Army to pay for the bus ticket. “We’re going to follow up with a call
next week to confi rm he arrived.”