Gov. Robert Bentley has announced a $20,000 grant to help the city of Wetumpka study the potential economic potential of the Wetumpka Crater.
Funding from the Appalachian Regional Commission will enable the city to gauge the success of a proposed education and research center that would focus on the catastrophic event which occurred during the dinosaur age when a meteorite struck the area leaving a highly visible five-mile-wide horseshoe shaped imprint.
The University of Alabama’s Center for Economic Development will conduct the study determining the economic role that the impact crater and the exhibition center could play in the city’s plans to increase tourism in the area.
The study will focus on local resources needed to build and maintain the center and will provide a strategic plan for making it a reality. The center would be built on 25-acre site on U.S. 231 that serves now as a city welcome center.
Funding also will support development of a website relating to the impact crater and exhibition center.
Wetumpka will provide $20,000 in matching funds for the study.
ARC was established by Congress in 1965 as a supplemental grant program to raise the standard of living, improve the quality of life and promote economic development in the Appalachian mountain region. Elmore is one of thirty-seven Alabama counties included in the ARC region, which encompasses all, or part of 13 states.
The Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs carries out the state’s ARC responsibilities.