Westchester Projects Receive $16 million in State Grants from MHREDC

For the third year in a row, the Mid-Hudson Regional Economic Development Council (MHREDC) was one of the state’s “Top Performers” receiving $87.1 million for 122 projects in the Hudson Valley region.

The MHREDC announced its grant awards on December 18 and Westchester County once again was one of the top winners. In Westchester County, 24 projects received a total of about $16 million this year, an increase over the $10.7 million awarded last year.

“These grants are vital to the economic strength of Westchester County,’’ said Marsha Gordon, President and CEO of the Business Council of Westchester. “I am proud that as a member of the Executive Committee of the MREDC, I am able to work to get this critically important funding to our communities in Westchester County.”

There were many winners in Westchester, ranging from municipalities such as Yonkers, Rye, Port Chester, Bedford and Peekskill who received awards to complete badly needed infrastructure upgrades to arts and cultural institutions which received smaller grants for programming and improvements.

The funding awarded through Round VIII of the Regional Economic Development Council Initiative, which was announced Tuesday by Gov. Andrew Cuomo, totaled more than $763 million. Since the initiative’s inception in 2011, over $6.1 billion has been awarded to more than 7,300 projects that are projected to create and retain more than 230,000 jobs statewide.

For a complete list of awards, click here. 

Among some of this year’s winners were:

• $3.964 million to City of Rye to improve its sewer system to reduce pollution in the Long Island Sound;
• $1.58 million to the Village of Sleepy Hollow to transform a vacant parcel that is part of the former General Motors site to a public commons space connecting to local rail and transit;
• $1.25 million to the City of Yonkers to continue its daylighting project along the Saw Mill River in downtown Yonkers;
• $1.07 million to the Greyston Foundation for capital improvements to its 21-23 Park Avenue Yonkers campus;
• $1 million to the Town of Bedford to construct six miles of sewer main to protect the watershed in the new Croton Reservoir;
• $980,000 to the Village of Port Chester for a Byram River Waterfront Promenade and other amenities as part of a waterfront revitalization program;
• $480,000 to Bre & Co. of Peekskill to implement an entrepreneurial hub along the Peekskill waterfront that will create technology, arts and creative jobs;
• $506,000 to Jacob Burns Film Center in Pleasantville to carry our capital improvements;
• $475,000 to Westchester Land Trust to protect 25.6 acres of land in the Town of Cortlandt;
• $450,000 to Westchester County to restore the 1928 carousel building and 1915 carousel damaged by fire;
• $137,000 to Thompson’s Cider Mill to convert a vacant building in Peekskill into a hard cider manufacturing facility, tasting room and eventually an event space;
• $100,000 to Westchester-Putnam Workforce Development Board for technical job training;
• $49,500 to ArtsWestchester to create a public art project at its White Plains headquarters.