Beavercreek City Council passed a resolution establishing the framework for funds received from the Federal American Rescue Plan Act at their regularly scheduled meeting on Monday, October 25, 2021.
This comes after the City of Beavercreek was approved to receive $5 million in federal COVID-19 rescue funds following the passage of House Bill 168. This bill allows cities, villages, and townships with a population under 50,000 (non-entitlement) to receive a portion of the $130 billion plan for local governments approved by the Federal Government for coronavirus relief.
The funds are to be used to mitigate the cost associated with the public health emergency and its negative economic impact. Half of these American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds are available this year and the remainder of the funds will be available in 2022. These funds have restrictions, which are categorized by U.S Treasury Department as Direct Eligible Expenditures and Loss Revenue Eligible Expenditures.
The City of Beavercreek calculated revenue losses directly related to COVID-19 and developed a strategic plan to allocate these funds based on specific guidelines. The city’s plan is to dedicate approximately 92 percent of the funds for infrastructure projects and the remaining 8 percent on capital expenditures.
Projects will include water and sewer, roads and stormwater infrastructure projects that are identified in the city’s Long Term Capital Improvement List. Several projects have been identified along with their estimated costs; however, the strategic use of the funds will be dictated by the actual cost and priority of each project.
“When developing the city’s strategic plan for use of these funds, the city focused on one-time funding of long-term/multi-year, high-impact projects that have little to no funding sources,” said Beavercreek
City Manager, Pete Landrum. “These funds will not be used toward salaries or ongoing operating expenses. Although these federal funds are critical to addressing some of the backlog of infrastructure projects, the impact of these funds will only address a small percentage of the city’s backlog of unfunded and underfunded infrastructure projects.”
U.S. Treasury Department guidelines stipulate these funds must be expended or encumbered/contracted by December 31, 2024, with expenditures being finalized by December 31, 2026.