Around a dozen people spoke regarding a request for giving American Rescue Plan Act funds as checks to essential and excluded workers at the Washington County Board of Supervisors meeting Tuesday.
Escucha Mi Voz Washington is one of multiple groups that have spoken at supervisors and city council meetings in Washington, Louisa, and Johnson counties in the past year, as many of them who work in the agriculture sector have had to work nonstop during the pandemic and undocumented workers did not receive the multiple rounds of COVID relief stimulus checks given by the federal government. After the group requested a public hearing last week, the board placed an item on the agenda with 11 people speaking in support of using the county’s allocated ARPA dollars on $1,400 checks to 3,000 essential workers who live in the county including 350 excluded workers. Washington County resident Craig Davis commented that the pandemic altered people’s lives and ability to provide for their families and pay costs of living, “As elected decision makers you have a historically unique opportunity to invest ARPA funds how you see fit. Five men deciding how to allocate several million dollars. I urge you to listen to the stories of excluded workers who helped keep our local economy running the past two years and allocate a generous portion of funds in the form of direct payments to their need. It’s never wrong to invest in human beings.”
The only comment against the request was made via Zoom by Jeff Cuddeback, believing it would be best to spend the funds on physical needs for the county and in effect reduce future tax asking for those projects. Board Chair Richard Young commented on the excluded workers’ request, “With these funds we’ve had 20 requests and we’re going to take our time doing this, because we have until December 31st of 2024 to make the decision on how we’re going to spend these funds by the law. Because we want to make a good decision when we make this. So we’re not going to hurry and rush this decision.”
Escucha Mi Voz Washington made a point that Johnson County Supervisor and Lone Tree resident Jon Green received guidance from the U.S. Department of Treasury last week stating that it is acceptable and appropriate to limit a cash assistance program to a subset of an eligible population that has been especially impacted by the pandemic, including prioritizing cash assistance for households that have not already received cash assistance to mitigate the pandemic’s hardships. The group reasons that if the county were to create a fund only for excluded workers it would cost $350,000 of the approximate $4.3 million allocated to the county. The group has also asked the City of Washington for $200,000 to give stimulus checks to the 140 excluded workers living within the city limits. They reason that if the county and the city partnered together on the “low-end” of their proposal, they could split the cost for $175,000 each. For a copy of their letter and information from the U.S. Treasury, click below.