With Kosciusko County’s American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds dwindling down, the ARPA committee met Wednesday to see where they stood and what was left to be done.
Originally, the county was awarded $15,433,397 in ARPA funds, based on its population. As of the committee’s meeting Wednesday, there was approximately $70,000 not allocated for any grants or county projects; about $20,000 came back as unused from completed grants; and there are some county projects that aren’t completed yet so there may be some more additional unused funds.
“So then we’ve got a whole bunch of information on our ARPA grant request letters,” said County Commissioner Cary Groninger, who chairs the county’s ARPA committee. “... I know as we walk through this, I thought we had a lot of really good documentation to justify where the money had been spent and what it had been spent on.”
The letters sent to grant recipients were part of the “paperwork” portion of closing the grants out, he said. “The other thing we talked about doing once we knew they were completed, we had the dollars, was we would actually do a site visit,” Groninger said. He suggested that the completed grant projects be split among the three committee members to do physical inspections of what county ARPA grant dollars helped fund and take photos for the ARPA file.
County Councilwoman Sue Ann Mitchell read through the grants given out to organizations and what the nonprofits didn’t use. County Administrator Marsha McSherry said if there was a zero in the balances account and it says the grant is complete, then the grant is complete.
“So you only have a few that are in the public that are not complete, like the (Kosciusko) Chamber of Commerce, they have one more year for that,” McSherry said.
Groninger said the grants that were not on their sheet were the ones for the county. Reading down the list of the nonprofit grants completed, he named the Animal Welfare League; The Beaman Home’s two grants, including for Mary Ann’s Place; Cardinal Services; CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) grant is continuing; Combined Community Services, two grants; Fellowship Missions; Joe’s Kids; Kosciusko County Convention & Visitors Bureau; Kosciusko County Historical Society; Kosciusko County Senior Services, Lakeland Regional Sewer District, two grants; North Webster Community Center; Wagon Wheel Center for the Arts; and YMCA.
Funds not used by the nonprofits for designated projects will return to the county, which Groninger said as of Wednesday was just short of $20,000. “Plus we had about $70,000 still left in our bucket.”
McSherry said the balance she had for funds not allocated was $70,544.65. She said they still have several county grants that are still open, including office disinfection, public safety communication radios, the jail shower project, tower connectivity and coroner equipment.
The committee divided the completed grants for the 12 nonprofits among themselves for inspection and photos. Mitchell took the North Webster Community Center, Lakeland Regional Sewer District, Senior Services and Joe’s Kids. Council President Mike Long took the YMCA, Historical Society, KCCVB and Fellowship Missions. Groninger got the remaining ones, including CCS, Cardinal Services, Beaman Home and AWL.
Mitchell suggested that when they get all the information pulled together, that they create a booklet or something to show the public what they accomplished with the county’s ARPA funds and how they spent the money.
“It doesn’t have to be an elaborate publication,” she said.
Groninger said that would be good. After the meeting, it was suggested a website could be created to highlight the grants and how they were used.
During the meeting, Groninger brought up an email from Kosciusko County Highway Department Superintendent Steve Moriarty.
“As he started to do his research and due diligence and design for the 1300 North project, as he started to study that intersection (with 500 West) and try to sort out how he was going to do that, he figured out that there was a pond there, a house there, some things that were going to impede the improvements that he wanted to do at that intersection that was going to drive the costs up significantly from what he had originally thought that intersection improvement was going to be,” Groninger said.
“So he came back with a proposal of, instead of spending that money on that intersection improvement, using it still for roads that are all connecting to 1300 North, just extending those out a little further away from that and improving some of the connecting roads that come into 1300.”
Groninger said he thought the change to the project, which uses some ARPA funds, was minor. He asked if the change needed to go back before the full commissioners and council, but Mitchell and Long agreed it did not.
“It’s the same amount, we’re not changing (that),” Groninger said.
Long made a motion to approve Moriarty’s request for changes to the CR 1300N project, Mitchell seconded it and the motion passed 3-0.
“I’m thankful he caught that now,” Mitchell said.
Along with the approximate $90,000 left in ARPA funds, Groninger said there are still some county projects where more funds could be possibly coming back. The county is required to allocate all the funding by the end of 2024 and it must be spent by the end of 2026.
“I know we’ve got a couple more meetings here yet this year to decide what that looks like,” he said, adding that at the committee’s next meeting, they probably need to be thinking about how they want to deploy dollars that came back or had not been used yet.
McSherry talked about the need for more security cameras at the county courthouse and work release. Groninger mentioned the Justice Building renovation project and the parking lot renovation.
Long asked about the water leak at the county courthouse and McSherry said that’s already been taken care of.
“But we are looking at a building assessment,” she said.
Groninger said at the next county commissioners meeting, McSherry is bringing before them a building assessment from Design Collaborative to do a complete building assessment. The report will include all the county buildings but an assessment won’t be done on the newer county buildings.
“That’s going to give us a pretty standardized format. We’ll be bringing this to the strategic planning meeting, hopefully in May, talking about what we’ve got in the proposal, so what that looks like. The commissioners are planning on moving forward with that, getting that started,” Groninger said.
The assessment will include thermal imaging of the roofs of the courthouse, Justice Building and church to detect any moisture in the insulation.
The committee also voted on its meeting dates for the remainder of 2024. They will be at 1 p.m. July 31, Oct. 16 and Dec. 18 in the old courtroom of the county courthouse.