Allen County Commission President Beth Seibert explains, “I am looking for opportunities as we move over these next few years to look at how might we bring those resources together on shared projects with sewer and water infrastructure or etc.”

Council received a letter from the Mayor with proposed usage of $26.5 million dollars from the American Rescue Plan that they will receive over the next year, which they have sent to council as a whole to discuss the issue. In the proposal, there is a proposed $9.5 million for revenue loss, $4 million for a community pool replacement project, $4 million in blight removal and housing and neighborhood renewal, whose ordinance was tabled indefinitely at the council meeting. 

Council approved setting up a special revenue fund where the money will be distributed from. The city has already gotten the first half of their funding, the one thing they are waiting on is instructions from the federal government on how they can spend it. Which was the same situation that the city was in the last time they got federal COVID money, as they waited for months for guidance before they could move forward.

The money is from the first half of the $5.4 billion the state will get from the American Rescue Plan. The bill allocates $250 million for water and sewer infrastructure, $422 million to local governments, and roughly $1.5 billion to repay a federal loan that was used for the increased number of unemployment payouts during the pandemic. By using the federal money to repay back the loan, that cost will not be passed on to Ohio business owners while they are working on recovering from the financial hit they took over the past year and a half.

Ohio is about to get a $12 billion cut of the recent $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, with our area receiving a large portion. Counties and cities in the state will directly be allocated $6.6 billion to help boost their economies affected by the pandemic. Auglaize County is set to receive nearly $8.9 million of that. They will see half of it soon, and the second half a year from now. County commissioners say they are waiting on guidance from the U.S. Treasury on how to use the financial aid. However, they do know it must all be spent by the end of 2026.