The Montana Department of Tourism is restructuring its grant program for incentivizing tourism in Montana. Department spokesman Daniel Iverson says the old system was much more complicated.

"We've been providing grant funds for a number of years to try to strengthen the tourism industry in Montana, but we had several different programs," Iverson said. "They all had their own structure, they all had their own funding pools and awards and deadlines schedules, so we decided to simplify everything and just put it into one pool."

The single pool is a fund of one million dollars that all qualified applicants can vie for.

"You can apply any time during the year and funds will be granted on a first-come, first-serve basis," Iverson said. "That gives tourism organizations and businesses a lot more flexibility on how to use the funds, so they don't have to wait for the specific program schedule to come up, they can just apply when they need it and they can get it awarded if they are successful applicants."

The new grant system will begin July 1.

 

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