From Deseret News archives:

16 companies getting funds from rural-aid program

Incentives help the firms hire more people or expand

Published: Tuesday, Aug. 19, 2008 12:16 a.m. MDT
 |  E-MAIL | PRINT | FONT + - 
A program designed to boost economic development in rural Utah is apparently working, according to an official overseeing the program.

The legislation creating the Rural Fast Track Program passed the Utah Legislature in early 2007. Beverly Evans, director of the Utah Office of Rural Development, said the program now has 16 companies that have received Industrial Assistance Fund grants to help them hire employees or otherwise grow their businesses.

Approved companies can get up to $50,000 under the program to help develop their businesses, or they can get $1,000 to $1,500 per created job, depending on how much over the county average annual wage the job pays. The businesses must have been in Utah at least two years, have at least two employees and be in counties with populations of less than 30,000 people who have an average county household income of less than $60,000.

The 16 program approvals could lead to 83 total new jobs — a far cry from much-publicized corporations recruited for Wasatch Front operations, but nonetheless key to rural areas of the state, Evans said.

Story continues below
"Let me tell you, four or five jobs make a difference in some of these rural companies, and they have been able to receive some assistance to expand their businesses," she told the Governor's Office of Economic Development Board last week.

For Applied Composite Technology, a prosthetic-limb manufacturing company in Gunnison, Sanpete County, the program could lead to hiring 12 more employees.

"In a rural community, each and every new job allows a family to stay in this area instead of having to move to the city and more populated areas," Shawn Crane, who is in charge of human resources, purchasing and information technology for ACT, said in a prepared statement.

B.W. Bowmar Co., a machine-shop manufacturing company in Escalante, Garfield County, is using program funds to upgrade to three-phase power. That is expected to make the company's electrical use more efficient and provide enough electricity to allow the company to quadruple its potential production capacity and hire two more full-time employees.

Talon Resources, an engineering, consulting and surveying company in Huntington, Emery County, expects to hire 11 new full-time employees from Emery and Carbon counties.

"We feel that we will be able to keep a small segment of our young workers home," Allen Childs, the company's president, said in a prepared statement. "They can start their careers and not have to move away from the county they call home. We will be able to provide jobs that will provide employees with growth potential and a higher-than-average county wage."


E-mail: bwallace@desnews.com

Comments

You can be the first to comment on this story.

previousnext

Latest comments

4A: Timpview wins 4th in 4 years

Relax! Your facts and scores mean nothing. Haven't you read the excuses (I...

Utes turn attention to rivalry

Why in the world were there utah fans all of last week claiming that BYU...

Huntsman blasts media over trip

Huntsman should get used to the way the media is outside of Utah. All of the...

Utes turn attention to rivalry

And we need to improve big time before next week.

Utes turn attention to rivalry

Our running game was not impressive tonight.

Whitt is the most predictable coach in football right now. I fear that BYU...

Utes turn attention to rivalry

Some of our fans were very unsportsman-like tonight. There was a lot of...

Glenn Beck to enter politics?

Beck and Palin 2012!!!!!! The circus has come to town!!!

I am concerned about the lack of variety in the play calling. I am concerned...

No, it wasn't "because she is a woman", it was because it was repeated six or...

Advertisements