Nationwide, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act will infuse the economy with stimulus spending and other appropriations totaling nearly $800 billion.

By the time that money trickles down - way down - the tiny burg of Flaxville will get a stimulus check for $7,530. Small as it sounds, the money will amount to nearly one-quarter of Flaxville's annual budget of $36,000.

"So that's a big boost for us," Mayor Connie Wittak said.

The 2009 Montana Legislature allocated $10 million in federal stimulus spending to Montana's 56 counties and $10 million to the state's 129 incorporated cites and towns.

Alec Hansen, director of the Montana League of Cities and Towns, said the Legislature decided to give every municipal government at least $5,000 and then appropriated the rest of the $10 million based on population and how much each city or town receives in annual gas tax appropriations.

Appropriations ranged from $1.6 million to Billings, which will use the money to reconstruct Alkali Creek Road, to Ismay, which will spend just less than $7,000 on general repairs and maintenance projects. The Custer County town has a population of 25.

Wittak said Flaxville, located in Daniels County barely 15 miles south of the Canadian border, will use the stimulus money to sand-blast and repaint the inside of the town's 10,000-gallon water tank. In a town of somewhat more than 100 people, the job should employ a crew of three to five people and will take about three months.

Wittak said the project is expected to be completed next summer. She didn't know exactly what the total cost of the project would be, but she expects that Flaxville will have to come up with some additional funds to supplement the stimulus check.

Under federal guidelines, cities and counties will have to spend all their stimulus money by Sept. 30, 2010. Hansen said most of the local governments needed very little time to come up with a project that qualified for stimulus funding. So many of the cities had long-deferred maintenance projects that they just picked the biggest one.

"That list, it doesn't include anything frivolous," Hansen said.

The Legislature also used stimulus money to steer other federal money in the direction of Montana cities and counties. Under the Treasure State Endowment Program, the state Department of Commerce annually distributes grants to local governments to help offset the costs of infrastructure projects.

This year, before stimulus money became available, the program had about $17 million to allocate, and 66 projects were submitted by local governments. There was only enough money to cover 31 of those projects, meaning the rest of them would have to wait at least another year.

But then the Legislature added $23 million in stimulus funds to the endowment, enough to fund all 66 projects. That was good news for Brockton, a Missouri River town of 245 in Roosevelt County.

It had been last on the list of projects, No. 66. Now, thanks to stimulus funding, it qualifies for a $750,000 grant to repair the town's sewage lagoon, which was breached by spring floods.

Brockton Clerk-Treasurer Charlotte Qualley said the final cost of the project might be twice that amount, and a lot of engineering and design work needs to be done before the project receives the money.

But, in a town where 1 mill brings in $82, the Treasure State Endowment money, supplemented by stimulus spending, "will be a tremendous help to have."

Contact Ed Kemmick at ekemmick@billingsgazette.com or 657-1293.