Nursing home, business center get help
Staff writer
Salem Home in Hillsboro will see its heating, ventilation, and air conditioning system upgraded after city council members approved up to $2.5 million in industrial revenue bonds Monday.
Salem technically will be titled to the city until the bonds are repaid.
“It’s effectively like collateral,” city administrator Matt Stiles said.
Stiles expects the loan to be repaid in 10 to 20 years.
“We’ll have to work out with them what they’re comfortable with in terms of repayment,” he said.
The council also voted to spend $30,000 on staffing for Central Kansas Entrepreneurship Center, which the city runs in partnership with Tabor College.
The only full-time employee is its director, Stiles said, so the money will go entirely to paying one employee.
Last year, Jeremy Ensey was director, but he is moving into a full-time teaching job, and a new director has not been announced.
Tabor provides the space, programming, and personnel for the center, now in its fourth year of existence.
“The city has supported this initiative as a key component of its rural economic development strategy, while Tabor aligns the work of the CKEC with its institutional mission,” Stiles said.
Two students are renting spaces for their businesses at the center. One runs a sports agency, and the other a leatherworking business.
The center also sponsors events throughout the year. Usually, these are business-related challenges, but some stand out in their quirkiness, such as a fly fishing class for Tabor students in February and March.
Stiles said he wasn’t concerned about the low number of students renting space at the center.
“A lot of what the CKEC does is education and working with people,” he said.
He added that the number probably would rise with improvements to the building.