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County Board Discusses Applying
for Viper Mine Grant
[June 16, 2025]
On Thursday, June 12th, the
Logan County Board met for their monthly Workshop meeting. This
meeting was held in the second floor courtroom of the Logan County
Courthouse starting at 6:00 p.m. All members of the board were
present except for Chairman JR Glenn. This included Vice Chairman
Dale Nelson, Lance Conahan, Michael DeRoss, Hannah Fitzpatrick,
Kevin Knauer, Joseph Kuhlman, Keenan Leesman, Bob Sanders, Kathy
Schmidt, Gil Turner, and Jim Wessbecher.
One of the issues discussed at this meeting was the Viper Mine grant
that the board has until the end of June to apply for. For other
items discussed at this meeting, please read LDN’s
article covering
this meeting, or its other article discussing funding for the Logan
County Tourism Bureau (LCTB).
Firstly, what is the Viper Mine grant? This grant, formally known as
the Energy Transition Community Grant Program, came out of the
closure of the Viper Mine in Elkhart. According to the Illinois
Times, this was a result of “the city of Springfield [choosing] a
cheaper coal supplier for its electrical power plant.” Due to the
fact that the Viper Mine was not located near any major railroads or
rivers, and the fact that there were no other major buyers nearby,
Knight Hawk Holdings decided to shutter the mine.
The state of Illinois has offered a grant to any taxing bodies that
were negatively affected financially by the closure of Viper Mine.
This application was posted only a little over a month before its
due date, which is June 30th at 5:00 p.m. Taxing bodies can include
places such as school districts, townships and cities, and counties.
To qualify, the taxing body must be within 30 miles of the closed
mine. Each party that applies for Phase 1 will get a guaranteed
$50,000 if they are deemed eligible. For Phase 2, the taxing bodies
will have until October 31st to submit a more formal grant
application, with things such as a proposal of how much money they
are requesting and then what they are going to use that money for.
This grant will be available once a year for six years, with taxing
bodies being required to apply each year.
At the Workshop meeting, this started with Finance committee
chairman Schmidt making a motion for Logan County to apply for the
grant, with DeRoss taking the lead on the application. DeRoss then
spoke, stating that there are many moving parts to the application.
He talked about combining several smaller taxing bodies who cannot
apply on their own with the Logan County application. Taxing bodies
that do not have a System for Award Management (SAM) number cannot
apply. While they can acquire one, the fast-approaching deadline for
the grant application may be too close for these bodies to get a SAM
number and have enough time left over to actually fill out the
application.
DeRoss stated that they would make
a subgrantee agreement with any of these smaller taxing bodies to
make sure they were all on the same page. DeRoss also clarified the
belief that the state may extend the deadline, as some people in
committee meetings have been speculating. He informed the board that
the state said if applications came in at 5:01 p.m. on the due date,
they would not be considered.
Zoning Officer Al Green then spoke, stating that the previous
promise of $25,000 for anyone who applied was upped to $50,000, so
long as the taxing body is determined to be eligible for the grant.
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Sanders then brought up the
possibility of fraud. He asked if Logan County would be liable for
the actions of any of its sub grantees if they received money only
to use it for something they were not supposed to as outlined in the
grant. DeRoss argued that there must be some trust between governing
bodies. He also stated that, should this happen, the county would
not apply for them again in the following years the grant is
available.
Leesman then brought up the idea of
just applying for the county this year, and maybe putting the money
they get into a county project. Next year, and the four years after
that, they could apply with sub grantees. DeRoss replied that, while
Leesman’s argument was logical, it may not be the best benefit for
the county. He asked if they should not be trying to get as much
state money into Logan County as possible. Leesman asked if his plan
could then be the fallback plan. DeRoss stated it would have to be,
but that they should shoot for as much as they can get.
Green then addressed the prior
fraud issue mentioned by Sanders. He stated that the state is not
going to simply write the accepted applicants a check. The system
the state has will be based on reimbursement. Each accepted
applicant will be told how much they will be receiving based on a
formula the state has not disclosed, and then will reimburse the
taxing body after the money is spent and a receipt is submitted.
DeRoss then mentioned that the county is going to need ideas on
Tuesday of what they themselves should apply for. Nelson then
brought up the idea of using the money to help pay for the exterior
elevator on the courthouse that needs to be fixed.
Nelson then informed the board that Glenn had given permission for
DeRoss to send out letters of support from the board on his behalf
since Glenn was unable to be in attendance. Earlier in the meeting,
Warrensburg-Latham school board president Tory Williams asked the
board for a letter of support for their school district to apply for
the grant themselves.
With no other discussion to be had on the matter, the motion was
moved to Tuesday night’s regular board meeting for a formal vote.
After this, the board moved on to items from the Transportation
committee.
[Matt Boutcher]
Sources:
IllinoisTimes.com
ArgusMedia.Com
omb.Illinois.gov
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