Serving the Big Horn Basin for over 100 years
Serving the Big Horn Basin for over 100 years
WORLAND – The Washakie County Commissioners met Tuesday morning in a Zoom call with the Wyoming State Loan and Investment Board (SLIB) to discuss their request for a Business Ready Community Enhancement Grant.
The grant is provided through the Wyoming Business Council (WBC) and will help renovate the former Kennedy’s Ace Hardware Building at 801 Big Horn to house the new Washakie County Library.
The SLIB board voted unanimously to approve the $500,000 request. The commissioners and County Clerk Mary Grace Strauch were joined by State Representative Mike Greear (R-Worland), Library Director Karen Funk and county grants manager Sheri Gunderson.
“It is an incredible project,” Governor Mark Gordon said during the SLIB hearing. “Absolutely critical for main-street there (Worland).”
According to the grant application, the funds that were requested by the county total $500,000 and will primarily be used for construction costs. The county was required to provide matching funds in order to receive the grant, which totaled just over $1.8 million through the one-cent sales tax, along with a $1 million donation from resident Mike Healy back in December.
In order to receive the grant, the former Ace building will also house the Worland/Ten Sleep Chamber of Commerce which has not had a permanent home since their original building on North 10th Street was discovered to have black mold, and was subsequently torn down.
According to the application submitted for the grant, “space will be created in the new library for business incubation and entrepreneurial use and for workforce training.”
These trainings will include but not be limited to at least four workforce training classes per year, creating three coworking spaces for support and incubation of start-up businesses and entrepreneurs along with entrepreneurial networking and mentoring events.
HOW WE GOT HERE
The process of moving to a larger space for the library has been a process that has been discussed since 2007, and began taking shape just over a year ago when the commissioners began discussing purchasing the building last April. The decision to pursue purchasing the building came after Lee and Jerry Kennedy decided to move their business into the former Shopko building shortly after it shut down.
The county purchased the building from the Kennedy’s in Sept. 2019 for $525,000 along with the repair shop building located on the north side of the block for an additional $125,000. The funding through the community enhancement grant will not be placed towards the additional building, and will strictly be used for funding construction on the existing 19,452 square foot building located on Big Horn Ave.
The Kennedy’s have since moved their business into the building located at 100 South 20th Street and opened in April, which will allow for the county to begin creating Requests for Proposal (RFPs) or contract work and begin construction and remodeling in the coming months.
The commissioners intend to meet with TSP, an architecture and engineering firm who created the concept for the library, in order to determine the next best steps and begin construction as soon as possible.