
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, December 28, 1993                   TAG: 9312280261
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B4   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: BRIAN KELLEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG                                LENGTH: Medium

MONTGOMERY BOARD RAPPED OVER FUNDING

The Montgomery County Board of Supervisors rejected a funding request Monday from a center formed to help small businesses in light of criticism that the board hadn't given enough money to one of the county's two chambers of commerce.

The New River Valley Small Business Development Center had asked for $1,000 for 1994, a small sliver of the county's $66.8 million budget.

But the supervisors, after briefly discussing a Dec. 17 letter from the Christiansburg-Montgomery County Chamber of Commerce, rejected the request, 6-0.

The business development center, a public-private venture affiliated with Virginia Tech, advises area entrepreneurs on planning, marketing, loan packaging and other matters.

It asked the county for money last winter, but the board rejected new funding requests because of tight revenue projections. The matter came up again Monday because the center had asked for money from the county's Economic Development Commission, which said it could not afford the request.

According to a letter from its director, David Shanks, the center helped clients create 20 new jobs, save three existing positions and stabilize another 36 during the first six months of this year.

But Supervisor Larry Linkous, himself a small-business owner, said he could not vote in favor of the request after reading the Christiansburg chamber of commerce letter.

H. Earnest Wade, chamber president, and president-elect Darryl J. Gillespie submitted the chamber's 1994-95 budget request with a letter that takes the board to task for cutting this year's appropriation.

The county gave the Christiansburg chamber and the Greater Blacksburg Chamber of Commerce $600 each, though the Christiansburg group had asked for $1,200.

"We were disappointed in the $600 received from the county this fiscal year compared to the services this chamber provides for county progress," Wade and Gillespie wrote.

The Christiansburg Town Council supplemented the chamber's budget with an additional $2,500 when it learned of Montgomery's reduction, they wrote. Christiansburg contributed a total of $7,500 to the business group.

Even so, with "three months remaining in our fiscal year . . . we are operating on a deficit budget," the two men wrote.

by CNB