ROCK SPRINGS — The City of Rock Springs is pursing numerous grants with the help of a government relations agency in hopes of finding funding to help pay for city projects.

During the Rock Springs City Council meeting Tuesday evening, the Council listened to an update from Clay Boothby and Megan Hart with Merchant McIntyre and Associates. Merchant McIntyre is “the only federal government relations agency that exclusively represents nonprofit institutions and organizations,” according to its website.

The City of Rock Springs entered into a one-year contract with Merchant McIntyre at $8,000 per month after a three-month trial period, Mayor Max Mickelson said. The benefits of going with Merchant McIntyre is the team is located in Virginia, which is close to Washington, D.C., the contract is less than what the city could hire a full-time person to do the work, and if the group doesn’t produce the results the city wants, they can terminate the contract without ending someone’s employment, Mickelson explained.

Boothby said the Community Projects Funding requests are the Congressional funding requests state representatives can support. Congresswoman Harriet Hageman (R-Wyo.) decided to support these requests this year, but they had to move fast to put forward the Bitter Creek Reclamation Project on the list to receive potential grant funding.

The city has already completed Phase 1 of the project and is looking to secure funding for the second of many phases. This request is one of six Congresswoman Hageman put forward. She was allowed to put forward 15, but wanted to narrow it down to what she felt were priorities.

Congress should start moving their appropriation bills along and the city should know within a month or so if it will receive the funding. This grant will come out of the Transportation, Housing and Urban, Development Account and will be for $3.5 million, Boothby said. While the $3.5 million will not cover the entire project, it will help the city continue to move forward.

“I know the goal is to move as much of the property out of the flood zone as you can and this would help do some of that,” Boothby said. “We’re not giving up on this though because there are still other phases to do…”

The RAISE Grant Program through President Joe Biden’s administration is another area where funding for Rock Springs might be available. Boothby said they are trying to obtain a $1.6 million grant to plan out future construction projects along Gateway. They should also know within the next month if the funding request was approved.

“It’s highly competitive and we’re hoping some of that’s geographically focused,” Boothby said.

Hart said the city also applied for a $115,000 grant from the United States Department of Agriculture through the United States Forest Service Urban and Community Forestry Program. The request is to plant 250 trees in Rock Springs over a 5-year span as well as removing invasive species, such as Russian Olive trees.

One grant the city applied for and did not receive was from the National Endowment for the Arts for the Chinese Massacre sculpture. While the city received good feedback in regards to the project, it was asked to make sure that it was reaching out to those impacted by the massacre, Boothby said. Even though the the massacre occurred on Sept. 2, 1885, the NEA wanted to see if the city reached out to those impacted by the massacre and if it had community support. Boothby said they have a better idea of what the NEA is looking for and will resubmit a request.

Mickelson said Sweetwater County School District No. 1 has been very supportive of the project and plans to take all of its third grade students to the sculpture every year to learn about the tragic, historical event.

“Obviously great history here. That event in terms of memorializing it and showing the impact of the community would be helpful,” Boothby said.

Boothby said he can use the information a local person is gathering about the historic site and how the school district is making it a part of its curriculum when they pursue the grant again.

Another project they are working hard to find grant funding for is the First Security Bank, however, a lot of the grants require that a business is already going into the building. Boothby said it’s a great space and great potential and they will keep looking.

These are just a few of the grants the city is pursuing. Boothby said they are only pursing grants that do not require a big match from the city or don’t require a match at all. They know the city doesn’t have a lot of money to spend on grant matches.