A first time for everything...

By Eamon Bencivengo

There is a first time for everything.  Last week I experienced my first submission of a county HOME grant application.  Although funded by the federal government, the HOME Program is administered by states and counties.  For instance, New Jersey’s Department of Community Affairs allocates the HOME dollars given to the state, while county HOME dollars are administered by county community development offices.  In generating funding streams for our projects, we submit applications to both the Department of Community Affairs and to the community development office of the county in which we are developing our project.  While the submission of two separate applications is manageable, the submission of the HOME application represents a challenge because no two such applications are alike.  The state application is different than those published by the counties, while the county applications vary from county to county.  Thus, it was last week that I was filling out the HOME application for Monmouth County; the county which encompasses our future special needs housing development in the town of Colts Neck.  With the help of our Housing Services Coordinator Jenai Gaccione, we carefully filled out the budgetary information required in the application.  Gina Plotino, our Director of Communications, also contributed to the task by supplying some of the many important documents which are required to be attached to the application.  Although we still have some more documents to send to the Monmouth County Community Development Office, we were able to submit the application prior to the deadline.  The Colts Neck Project has taken its first step to completion!