American Rescue Plan Act legislation is a big deal for Fort Bend County
There was a great article in DS News on how residential leasebacks could help people who face potential foreclosures.
Here’s where local leaders say the money will go
A new round of stimulus has been approved and what this means for Fort Bend County.
The Houston Chronicle wrote the following article.
Let us know what you think.
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The American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, signed into law by President Joe Biden on Thursday, has allocated $1.9 trillion in COVID-19 relief aid, much of which will be handed directly to state and local authorities to bring swift aid to municipalities and school districts.
U.S. Rep. Al Green, D-Houston, has been a major proponent of the bill since its inception. Green, whose 9th Congressional District encompasses Fort Bend County and south Houston, convened a press conference with local leaders on Friday to discuss how the funds from the act will be allocated- and where that money will go.
“The American Rescue Plan includes $350 billion in funding for states and municipalities that have been hard hit by the COVID-19 pandemic due to dwindling sales tax revenue,” Green said. “This influx of funding will help these municipalities work to recover from and continue fighting the coronavirus crisis.”
Fort Bend County Judge KP George praised the allocation of funds to the counties. The CARES Act, predecessor to the American Rescue Plan Act, granted funding to the state with murky instructions as to how the funds should be dispersed, George said.
“When it comes to the CARES Act, 55 percent of the money authorized to us- we don’t know where it went,” said George. “That’s why (the American Rescue Plan Act) legislation is so beautiful. Because the money that is coming to Fort Bend County belongs to Fort Bend County.”
Missouri City city council member Jeffrey Boney agreed that dispersing funds to local municipalities enables the aid to go where it’s needed most. “We wanted the money to come directly to municipalities like Missouri City because we know best what our constituents need in the midst of COVID-19,” Boney said. “We’ve lost revenue. Many of our residents have been impacted in many of our small businesses.”
School districts will receive funding directly as well. Alief ISD will receive about $200 million in aid. Stafford MSD will receive about $3.2 million and Fort Bend ISD will be allocated about $112 million.
Melinda McCall, president of the Fort Bend American Federation of Teachers, noted that the funding to Fort Bend ISD will go to increasing campus safety against the virus.
“All of Fort Bend is going through a tough time, because our teachers love our kids, and they want to be in the classroom with the kids. But they can’t do that if they’re not safe,” she said. “This money will help support the excessive educational needs that we continue to have in the school district because of COVID.”
Alief ISD superintendent HD Chambers said that his district’s allotment will enable schools to fill some of the educational gaps left behind in the 2019-2020 school year. Chambers estimated that it may take up to six years for the district to bounce back to its pre-COVID-19 educational and economic status.
“This $200 million that we’re receiving will be spent on things like lowering class sizes, and we will be bringing in outside tutors and mentors,” he said. “It will also be used to provide transportation for our students who have no transportation, and it will be used for providing the type of resources, devices and technology we’ve learned we need.”
House of Representatives Bill 1669, authored by Green, allocates $10 billion to help small businesses.
Of that $10 billion, Green said, $500 million will go to employers with nine or fewer employees. Another $2.5 billion will go to minority depository institutions, which are small banks. These small banks directly offer loans to small businesses, which further bolsters area economies.
“That money goes to the bank, and the banks have explicit things that they can do with the money in terms of making loans to small businesses,” Green said. “It is designed for small businesses, and my intent is to give it to small businesses.”
Through HR 1674, the Fair Housing Initiative Program, $39.7 million will go to ensuring that landlords are not discriminating against potential tenants.
“The need for fair housing enforcement has increased significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic. The National Fair Housing Alliance found that – as Asian Americans endure an alarming spike in hate crimes related to the coronavirus – 8 percent of fair housing organizations have experienced upticks in complaints based on national origin of Asian-Americans or Pacific Islanders,” Green said. “The inclusion of HR 1674 in the American Rescue Plan will provide a much-needed $20 million in grants for emergency fair housing enforcement to help mitigate this upsetting trend.”
Green concluded, “When the deadly novel coronavirus reached the United States more than a year ago, many of us would have never imagined the severe health and economic toll it would take on our nation. However, it has been and continues to be my priority to ensure all my constituents – including those who have suffered from contracting the virus themselves or losing a loved one to it, job loss, inadequate access to health care, hunger, risk of eviction or foreclosure, or business closure – receive the necessary relief to weather and recover from this storm.”