Community Development Block Grant Public Facilities For Economic Development (CDBG-PFED)

The CDBG Public Facilities for Economic Development Program helps underwrite the cost of municipal infrastructure necessary for business development that retains or creates employment opportunities.

Eligible activities are improvements to public facilities such as water systems, sewerage systems, and roads that are owned by a general or special purpose unit of government, and which will principally benefit businesses, and which as a result will induce businesses to create jobs and invest in the community.

An eligible applicant is a general purpose unit of government with a population less than 50,000 that is not enrolled in the Community Development Block Grant Entitlement Program. This includes any county, other than Dane, Milwaukee, or Waukesha Counties.

Each project is eligible for up to $750,000 in CDBG-PFED funds per calendar year.

A pre-application meeting must be held with Commerce staff to discuss the potential application. Applications must comply with the following criteria:

• The business must create or retain, at a minimum, one full-time-equivalent job for each $10,000 of PFED funding.
• At least 51 percent of the jobs must be made available to persons of low and moderate income.
• The business investment for its expansion project must be at least equal to the PFED funding.
• The business must demonstrate its project is feasible.
• The applicant must demonstrate its financial need for the PFED funds.
• The applicant must show that the proposed project is the best alternative for the business and community.
• The applicant must provide at least 25 percent of project funding.

The Implementation Manual has been updated as of May 2003. You can find a specific list of changes to the manual here. Now available in a self-extracting Word Document is the 2007 Implementation Manual (Please Note: when printing the manual, the first page number at the bottom of each page corresponds to the chapter number, the second number after the hyphen is used when instructing your printer what page numbers you want printed. This was done intentionally to assist you in printing. For example, if you only want to print Chapter 3, instruct your printer to print pages 23 to 59, which are all of the pages in Chapter 3). Numbering of the Implementation Manual on the web is different from the hard copy. Do not make cross-reference using page numbers.

The 2007 Implementation Manual (2,638 KB)

Use the Implementation Manual that was effective at the time your project was funded.

To arrange for a pre-application meeting, contact:

Jim Frymark
WI Department of Commerce
Bureau of Community Finance
P. O. Box 7970
Madison, WI 53707
Telephone: 608/266-2742
Fax: 608/266-8969

Commerce staff may request additional information to complete its review. If an award is made, the applicant will receive an award letter from Commerce. A contract will be executed between the community and Commerce.

The community receiving the grant will be responsible for administration, of the CDBG funds. This will include entering into a development agreement between the community and the business for the jobs to be created and the private investment to be made. This includes compliance with other program requirements of the business. To obtain more information on this and other Commerce financing programs, please contact at the address and telephone number listed above or email Jim Frymark.