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BURLINGTON — Schurz Communications will be accelerating community investments it promised in the purchase of Burlington Telecom to aid the city’s recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.
Burlington Mayor Miro Weinberger said Monday during his coronavirus update that funding from Schurz will be used for $50,000 in workforce development grants now instead of in October, as originally scheduled.
Schurz announced last fall that the company would be investing $3 million over the next 10 years for entrepreneurs in Burlington to fulfill its community obligation negotiated in the sale of BT, which received regulatory approval last year.
The funds are managed by BTV Ignite, a nonprofit focused on using technology to spur economic growth in Burlington. Adam Roof, the organization’s project manager, said the timeline was moved up to meet immediate needs caused by Covid-19.
In 2019, $20,000 was awarded to Generator, a facility that provides space for entrepreneurs, and $30,000 to Mercy Connections, an educational organization that aims to create opportunities for women.
The application for the funding closes May 22 and is available on BTV Ignite’s website. Roof said the organization was aiming to evaluate applications late this month and get the grants to the selected organizations in early June.
Schurz will also be offering two rounds of investments from the Burlington Telecom Innovation Fund this year. The company will announce the recipients of $200,000 in funding in coming weeks, and will be doing a second round of investments in the fall for a total of $500,000 in investments this year.
Roof said that two rounds of funding are occurring this year because investments were not made in 2019 and were rolled over into this year as the committee did not have enough time to wrap up the process last year.
Weinberger said the investments were welcome due to the number of companies that have been forced to forgo or delay investments of all types due to the pandemic.
“The fact these investments are happening here in Burlington, two rounds of investment, of this magnitude, in the Burlington economy is welcome news during a tough time economically, financially, for the city,” he said.
Weinberger said he was concerned that the economic hardships caused by coronavirus might prevent Burlington Telecom from making the promised investments.
“I really welcomed the news that Burlington Telecom is moving forward with these community investments as they committed, in fact, faster than they committed,” he said.
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