The city of Lacombe is making some local movers and shakers happy, with the announcement that they are increasing the funding of the Recreation and Culture Grant program.

The grant, which helps support new local programs and services, is widely popular, allowing an average of 6 grants every year.

Director of Community Services Debra Juch says one of council's primary goals is to help support local initiatives in all forms.

“There’s an awful lot of groups in town that are doing programming, so that’s recreation and culture programming, and this council likes to support and augment what they’re doing. It’s meant to add to their funding, so they are doing a lot of fundraising on their own, and this grant helps support them.”

She says this grant serves more as a boost to new programs or services that need a hand starting out.

“It’s primarily used for new programing, or an extension of an existing program, but it’s not meant to fund on-going operations.”

Groups like the Lacombe Arts Guild, the Lacombe Performing Arts Foundation, and the Young Adults of Lacombe have all received this grant in the past.

The total amount of funds available is now $12,500, after going through a cut back the last few years.

For more information on how to apply for this grant, you can go to Lacombe.ca/recgrant.

All applications are due by February 29th, 2019.