Jefferson County’s effort to convert a building on the former Montana Developmental Center’s South Campus in Boulder to a new health facility faced a significant setback this month, when the Montana State Legislature’s Joint Appropriations Subcommittee on Long Rang Planning declined to approve a $500,000 historic preservation grant that was deemed necessary to fund the project.
“We have not received an official response as to why Cottage Five did not receive funding,” said Leah Lewis, a project coordinator with the Jefferson Local Development Corp. who is responsible for coordinating planning and grantseeking for the Cottage Five renovation project. “The majority of the projects that did receive funding only received a partial award from their original request.”
According to Jefferson County officials, the Joint Appropriations Subcommittee ultimately ignored the Department of Commerce’s project rank order in favor of its own, unspecified evaluation criteria. Roughly $5 million was awarded to 25 different preservation efforts across the state. The Department of Commerce originally ranked the county’s Cottage Five restoration project as 23rd among 63 project submissions.
