Jane and Ron Del Greco, of Cranberry Township, follow a map along Sippel Reservoir Park’s trail to Scholar’s Run Pedestrian Bridge in Jackson Township in 2023. Austin Uram/Butler Eagle

As Jackson Township’s population continues to expand, financial assistance is becoming more ubiquitous.

Supervisors during a meeting on Thursday, Sept. 19, accepted $102,343 as part of a Community Development Block Grant that will go toward initiatives that benefit primarily low-to-moderate income people.

Township manager Chris Rearick said the grant, which is provided by the state’s Department of Community and Economic Development, is limited in scope, but there are several uses that make sense.

“We try to use some for demolition of unsafe structures,” he said. “So we continue to do that. And then we’re allowed to use money for housing rehabilitation for folks of low or moderate income. And then that goes through the county’s housing authority. It’s usually split for all of those projects.”

Each year, the township must submit a plan to be eligible for the funding, which is distributed on an annual basis. In a related move taken by the supervisors on Thursday, they submitted the application for next year’s grant funding.

Since the money must be put toward specific initiatives that follow the guidelines of the grant, some of the items in the township’s plan include improving the sidewalk system in various parts of the township and providing an ADA access pad for fishing at Sippel Reservoir Park, which is one of the parks the township is aiming to upgrade in the coming years.

The grant does have an expiration date. However, that has not been an issue for officials thus far.

“It has to be used within a certain period of time,” Rearick said. “So far, we’ve been successful in doing that.”