LEWISTON – With their final year’s federal funding guaranteed, Empower Lewiston’s board will begin looking for ways to continue their community building efforts.

“We’ll be looking at transitioning, moving strategically beyond the federal designation in a way that preserves our work as a grassroots organization,” said Alyson Stone, executive director of Empower Lewiston. “There are still a number of initiatives we can be involved in.”

Stone confirmed that the effort will receive $123,152 from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Rural Development program for fiscal 2009. That year begins in October, she said.

It will be the organization’s tenth and final year as a part of the federally designated Enterprise Community program. That’s designed to bring economic and community development to some of the nation’s poorest communities. Lewiston received the designation for two downtown census tracts, listed as the poorest in the state. The tracts encompass parts of downtown bordered by Lisbon Street, East Avenue, Webster Street and the Androscoggin River.

Stone said she and directors have known how much money they would receive since January. The final tally was announced this week by the Department of Agriculture. Empower Lewiston plans a press event on June 12, during the local Business to Business Trade Show breakfast.

“We’ve known, for 10 years, that we would get some revenue, but we don’t usually know how much,” Stone said. The group received $250,000 for the first year. That was reduced to $167,965 last year – and by another $44,000 for the final year.

“It’s continued getting smaller, so we were expecting it,” she said. “We still have money left over from previous initiatives to move some things forward.”

Stone said she expects work efforts in the coming year will focus on transportation issues for downtown dwellers – including getting better shuttle service and more frequent downtown bus routes – and creating a cooperative market downtown.

“That would be something; memberships offering bulk buying and the ability to do staffing on a volunteer basis,” she said.