Heartland Port Authority Officials vowed to push on after the port authority failed to receive a $750,000 federal grant this week.
The U.S. Department of Transportation announced winners of $1.5 billion in BUILD grant funding Tuesday. Members of the port authority's board of commissioners hoped the grant would pay for preliminary engineering studies on the two sites of a proposed Missouri River Port. Now Port Authority board members said the port authority will seek alternative grants to pay for the work.
BUILD grants, formerly TIGER grants, fund road, rail, transit and port projects that create significant local or regional impacts. On Tuesday, the Transportation Department awarded grants to 91 projects in 49 states. Five projects in Missouri received a total of $90.2 million in funding.
Roger Fischer, Callaway County Western District Commissioner and vice chairman of the port authority's board of commissioners, said the port authority plans to explore other rural development grants from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and other federal infrastructure grants
"There's other options out there," he said. "This one was just a really big opportunity to get tapped into the federal government in the early stages."
In July, the Jefferson City Council and Cole County Commission agreed to match the federal government's share of the grant with $75,000 each if the grant was successful. At the time, the Callaway County Commission agreed to spend $37,500 if the grant was successful.
All told, a successful grant would've allocated $937,500 toward the survey work.
This summer, Jefferson City and Cole County also approved spending $150,000 if the grant failed. Callaway County declined to spend $75,000 if the grant failed.
Fischer said Callaway County wants to be involved in the project and could vote later to spend additional funds on the work.
Heartland Port officials are considering two sites for the port: One plan in southern Jefferson City would build the port near the Missouri National Guard Ike Skelton Training Facility. The other plan would split the port between the southern site and a second port in Callaway County in northern Jefferson City near OCCI Inc.
Building only the south site would cost at least $54.77 million, according to a February feasibility study conducted by Atlanta Consultancy firm Cambridge Systematics. The two-site plan would cost $59.5 million.
An additional $10 million would be needed for roadway improvements. Engineering and planning services would cost $1 million more.
Kris Scheperle, Cole County Western District commissioner and secretary of the port authority's commission, said the most immediate focus for the port authority is to seek a land conveyance that would allow the authority to build the southern port site on 125 acres of state-owned land.
Scheperle said the board will likely consider alternative grants at its next meeting Jan. 8. A grant of up to $200,000 from the Missouri Department of Agriculture also could hold promise for the port authority, he said.
"I don't know if we'll revisit doing something on a smaller scale as far as survey work," he said.
Last month, the board of commissioners voted to hire the Jefferson City Area Chamber of Commerce to market the port, lobby on its behalf and prepare grants. Missy Bonnot, chamber director of economic development, said the port authority was disappointed to not receive the grant, but it learned from the experience.
"It gave us a lot of the tools we need to go forward on the other grants," she said. "Now that we've written the first one, it's going to make it easier for us to apply for other ones."
Scheperle said the Agriculture Department grant could give the port authority an idea of what companies may use the port.
"I'm still optimistic this project could be a game changer, but this other grant opportunity really could help us to know what businesses could utilize the port," he said.