City Hall will award grants to a whiskey maker and a startup on Main Street, deciding that both were worthy of taxpayer support but also denying the full grant requests from each of them.
The Park City Council agreed to provide economic-development grants to:
High West Distillery, which will receive $11,000 in assistance as it prepares to open on Park Avenue close to the Town Lift.
the Park City Performing Arts Foundation, which will receive $9,000 as it opens the 826 Park City Project on Main Street. The project will sell merchandise to inspire the minds of youngsters. Literacy tutoring will also be offered at the site.
High West had sought $20,000. The Arts Foundation wanted $15,000. City Councilors, though, only had $20,000 to split between the two requests.
The City Council made the decisions just after their annual budget talks. City Hall staffers expected to issue the checks as early as Friday afternoon.
High West wanted the money to help defray the cost of moving distilling equipment from Salt Lake City to the historic Watts property in Old Town, where the operation will be housed. City Councilors, though, rejected High West’s bid for assistance with a storytelling exhibit at the site.
Before indicating they would allocate the money to the two, City Councilors in the last two weeks especially spent time on the request from High West. City Councilman Roger Harlan mentioned during an earlier meeting that alcohol can cause family difficulties, but he supported the assistance. Candy Erickson, a City Councilwoman, said she had some unease in providing a grant to a for-profit business like High West.
Mayor Dana Williams, who does not hold a vote, said he initially had trouble with the idea of providing taxpayer assistance to an alcohol maker and later wondered whether a precedent would be set by providing funding to help move equipment.
City Councilman Jim Hier, though, countered that High West is a new business instead of a long-running one that is requesting help with relocation expenses.