Moffat fund to hand out cheques

A dozen local applicants to the Moffat Family Fund soon will receive their share of the $50,000 pot the town had been allocated for 2004.
Fort Frances administrative assistant Kathy Lawson confirmed this week the recipients will be presented with their cheques during the council meeting this coming Monday night.
Fort Frances CAO Mark McCaig said last month that the Winnipeg Foundation had approved the list of 12 applicants recommended by the local Moffat Family Fund committee last fall.
He had noted then that the successful applicants, nor the projects they were looking to fund, would not be publicly announced prior to the presentation.
Individuals and organizations were invited last summer to submit their requests, including a specific dollar amount and the rationale behind the request, to the local Moffat Family Fund committee.
A total of 32 local individuals and organizations filed their applications by September. Altogether, they requested a total of $361,019.84 in funding.
A dozen of those then were chosen by the local Moffat Family Fund committee in October and forwarded to the Winnipeg Foundation for final approval.
The criteria to access the Moffat Family Fund is that the request must be to help financially support a project “to help local youth and families.”
The town had received 21 requests during the previous application process in 2003.
After deciding who the recipients would be and how much they would receive, a total of $56,365 ended up be divided between 13 local recipients last January.
They included the Kiwanis skate park committee, Fort Frances Highlanders, Fort Frances Volunteer Bureau, Fort Frances Centennial Celebrations Advisory Committee, Fort Frances “Community Chest”/Canadian Cancer Society, and the Fort Frances and District Association for Community Living.
The others were the Fort Frances Museum, Friends of the Library, Friends of Little League, Joy of Life Fellowship Church, Memorial Sports Centre, Fort Frances OPP (D.A.R.E. program), and Rainy Lake Air Cadet Squadron.
Back in 2002, the Moffat family entrusted $100 million to the Winnipeg Foundation, which, in turn, is responsible for investing the money and distributing it to communities in need.
After learning of this, Fort Frances applied for—and was chosen to be—one of these recipient communities. That first year, the town was allocated $33,000 to divvy up.
Year after year, the town—along with other communities once served by the Moffat family’s cable television business—is eligible to receive some of the interest from that $100-million investment.
Fort Frances is among 12 communities that are being allocated funds to distribute to worthwhile causes this year.