Rock Rapids, Iowa — Lyon County Schools, Cities, and County government continue to win big with grants from the Lyon County Riverboat Foundation.
The foundation is the non-profit license holder for the Grand Falls Casino near Larchwood. State law mandates a certain percentage of the casino’s gaming take has to go back to the community. The agreement between the casino and the non-profit stipulates that for the first $20 million the casino collects in gambling winnings in a year, they will give the foundation 4.5 percent. When they get up to $20 million, the percentage goes up to 4.75 percent; and when they get up to $30 million, it goes to 5 percent.
The Lyon County Riverboat foundation is set up to give half of the money in grants to county government subdivisions and schools, and half in a competitive grant process to non-profit projects.
This time, Lyon County public schools — Central Lyon, George/Little Rock, and West Lyon are each being granted a little over $43,000. That makes their total so far for 2015 about $84,400 per school. Since the Riverboat Foundation started giving grants in 2011, each school has received nearly $678,000.
Lyon County cities are given grants based on their population. They range from about $13,000 for Lyon County’s smallest incorporated community of Alvord to almost $16,000 for Rock Rapids this time around. That brings the total so far for 2015 to a low of almost $26,000 for Alvord to a high of nearly $31,000 for Rock Rapids. Since the grants started in 2011, the total ranges from almost $209,000 for Alvord to over a quarter of a million for Rock Rapids.
The County of Lyon is being given just over $18,000 this time, bringing the 2015 total so far to over $35,000, and the grand total to-date to almost $290,000.
The total amount being given to government subdivisions in this quarter is nearly $260,000 and so far for 2015, the total is over half a million dollars. You can find all the exact amounts in the table below.
The foundation says that what the government subdivisions do with the money is up to each one’s board or council.
The grand total given away to the government subdivisions by the foundation so far is over $4 million. Another $4 million has been given to non-profit projects in the competitive grant process. The deadline for the next round of competitive grant applications is in September, and the grants will be announced during a ceremony at the Grand Falls Casino and Resort in October .
Plus, the foundation has also started a new grant process called mini grants. The deadline for mini grant applications was June 23rd. According to David Childress with the foundation, over 200 applications for the up-to-$2000 grants were received. There is up to $100,000 to give away. He says the grant recipients will be announced July 21st at the Grand Falls Casino and Resort.
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