Grant Writer Pilot

TNRD launches community grant writer pilot program

Jun 15, 2025 | 10:52 AM

KAMLOOPS — The Thompson-Nicola Regional District (TNRD) has launched a new Community Grant Writer pilot program, that will aim to support non-profit groups across its ten electoral areas seek out and apply for grant funding.

Financial Supervisor Austin Potts the new pilot was launched following an increase in requests for help in writing grants being made by Electoral Area Directors as well as groups in rural areas of the TNRD.

The program, he said, will also be available to non-profits in other areas of the TNRD if they provide a benefit or service to the electoral areas.

“Whether its failing infrastructure or if they’re doing a program or if they have an event and they’re struggling to find funding, the hope with this grant writer is that they will work one-on-one with these communities,” Potts said. “We’ll help them craft the best possible grant application that they can to ensure their odds of success in getting that funding.”

Potts said non-profit groups interested in consulting with the TNRD can reach out via email or through the website. All requests, he said, will be assessed on a first-come, first-serve basis.

“Our plan is for the first contact with them is a quick 30 to 60 minute meeting where we’ll figure out what they’re trying to do, get a feel for their organization, and where their goals are,” Potts added.

“We’ll then do a little bit of research and see what grant opportunities are available and then if they want to move forward, we would actually do the majority of the application on their behalf and submit it for them.”

This pilot program is being funded by a $25,000 grant from the Economic Trust of the Southern Interior (ETSI-BC). Potts said it adds to an $8,000 grant the TNRD has been getting from the Northern Development Initiative Trust (NDIT) for the past several years.

“The NDIT grant went towards Electoral Areas E and I and in those two areas we were contracting out to Gold Country to do some grant writing,” Potts said. “We came across the ETSI-BC grant which covered the rest of our region, so we pooled together the two grants into one pooled fund that we can spread across the TNRD.”

Potts said the plan, at first, is to support all areas of the TNRD equally, but noted it will be adjusted as needed.

“All regions are getting an equal amount of time and we’re going to try and stick to that as much as we can,” he said. “But If one region ends up not needing the help that much, then we may rejig how that looks in the future.”

“That’s if the directors are happy with the success of the program and they want to continue doing it. There is definitely the other side of it and they may decide that it was just a one year pilot and they’re not interested in moving ahead with it.”

He said some groups have already reached out to the TNRD for help in writing grant applications, while others have reached out for information on what grants are available to them.

“We’ve had some groups reach out to us that we don’t deal with in any other capacity and we also have several groups in the queue ready to go with lots of big dreams,” Potts said. “I’m pretty hopeful about the success of the program.”