Innisfil council donates to school and charities
By Chris Simon

From a public school to Christmas Cheer, Innisfil council was in the giving spirit recently.

Town council granted over $42,000 in funding for several local community organizations, during a recent meeting. The Alcona Beach Club received $15,000, the Barrie and District Christmas Cheer Campaign earned $10,000 and Georgian Bay Steam Auto Gas and Antique received $13,900 in funding, as part of the town's Community Reinvestment Fund.

The Goodfellow Public School PTAreceived $2,304, and Ethan Belchos earned $1,000, as part of the funding.

"It's a very positive step for our community, we should all be proud of it," said mayor Brian Jackson.

However, the town needs to promote the program more effectively. Very few groups apply for money each year, he said.

"There are groups that access this fund a number of times," said Jackson. "It's meant to be distributed around the municipality to the various groups and organizations. This keeps adding for one particular groups, I've noticed."

Councillor Lynn Dollin agrees.

"It's hard to turn groups down, and there are some pretty determined groups, if they meet the criteria. We don't have enough applications," she said. "If we organize some kind of advertisement or make a deal out of it when we give a group their money, we might see more groups applying."