The Columbia Valley Directed Funds Committee voted in Wendy Booth as chair and Dee Conklin as vice chair for the upcoming year, passed a resolution supporting renewal of the committee’s agreement with the Columbia Basin Trust (CBT), and heard a presentation from the Columbia Valley Food Corridor Association at its most recent meeting.

The committee receives its funding from the CBT, and is entering the third year and last part of its initial contract with the trust.

“We are looking forward to see if the program will be renewed or not,” said Booth.

During the Monday, September 8th Directed Funds Committee meeting, Bill Croft and Rosemary Oaks presented the findings of the food incubator feasibility study conducted for the food corridor association by consultants back in April. The report concluded that the concept of a food business incubator (which would be a collection of resources and services to help food-based businesses grow) in the valley is feasible if pursued in incremental steps and scaled up where appropriate. The report’s conclusions also cited concerns about governance capability of a local food incubator project and said these would need to be addressed.

“As for next steps for this project it is in the hands of that group (the food corridor association),” said Booth.

At the September 8th meeting, the Committee also supported a request from the Columbia Cultural Tourism Association to extend its agreement with the committee for six months to give the association more time to leverage the funds previously allocated to them by the Directed Funds Committee. The committee also invited the Toby Creek Nordic Ski Club to its next meeting on Monday, October 27th to discuss the Nordic club’s funding proposal.