PORT TOWNSEND — Jefferson County and the city of Port Townsend are scrambling to dole out slightly more than $807,000 in unspent CARES Act money to coronavirus relief projects on a community-compiled wish list worth a combined $981,365.
“This is a huge decision,” County Commissioner Kate Dean said Wednesday during a meeting of the Intergovernmental Collaborative Group (ICG), which includes all members of the Board of County Commissioners, the City Council, the Jefferson County Public Utility District (PUD) and the Port of Port Townsend.
“We have a lot of public dollars to allocate, and deciding how to do that is not evident,” she said. “It’s tricky.”
That $807,615 represents a combination of county and city funds — $663,515 of which is left over from nearly $2.4 million the county has received this year and $144,100 that the city expects to receive soon — that must be allotted and reported to the state Department of Commerce by Nov. 30, a deadline that was recently extended from Oct. 31.
During Wednesday’s meeting, members of the ICG heard from representatives of six community groups that have developed funding priorities and their associated costs.
The ICG members also offered comments to help county and city staff develop recommendations that county commissioners will consider during today’s board meeting.
“The City Council will decide where to allocate its funds, but the plan is to do so in tandem with the county’s allocations,” City Manager John Mauro said. “Instead of separate processes … it makes sense for us to do this together.”
Guidance from the U.S. Department of Treasury and the state Department of Commerce makes clear that the money must address immediate impacts — whether in terms of public health or economic fallout — from the COVID-19 pandemic between March and the end of this year, said Patty Charnas, the county’s Community Development director and its COVID-19 finance section chief.
“COVID-19 caused two disasters: a public health emergency as well as an economic one,” she said.
And while officials agreed that the county has many economic issues that predate the pandemic, County Administrator Philip Morley said it’s critical to ensure the funds address the direct impacts of the pandemic and the costs caused by it.
“That nexus must absolutely be there in order for there to be eligibility,” he said. “The danger for us is, if we stray from that, both the city and county are subject to both state and federal audits. If there is an audit finding that something was ineligible, the city or county, out of our general funds, are on the hook for potentially paying that money back.”
Prioritized lists of projects and their associated costs came from six community groups: culture and events, economy and jobs, children and families, human services, food system resiliency and broadband.
A handful of projects from other sectors also is included.
Dean, who represents the county in the Washington State Association of Counties, said she has not seen any other county conducting as transparent and collaborative a process to distribute CARES Act funds as Jefferson.
“This is unique that we’re gathering this much input,” she said.
The top priority of the children and families group, for example, is to establish a family resources navigator through the YMCA at a cost of $55,000, which would in part pay for development of a user-friendly website and a phone line staffed by the navigator to connect families with resources, such as affordable childcare.
“Families are experiencing an increased need for child care during COVID because they are working from home and have their kids home part time,” said Jean Scarboro, clinical director at Jumping Mouse Children’s Center.
Scarboro said that project could be combined with the human services group’s proposal for an OlyCAP navigator to help residents access urgent mental, physical and substance-related health services for a combined cost of $70,000.
Among other things, the culture and events group is seeking hand-washing stations, a public restroom trailer, personal protective equipment and two 90-foot by 90-foot tents for outdoor events, with Key City Public Theatre Director Denise Winter noting that matching funds have been identified for one $48,000 tent if the other is paid for with CARES Act money.
“They will go up once and stay up for a long period of time, serving many events throughout the year,” she said.
Many officials agreed that investing in broadband internet service would be valuable in allowing students better access to online school resources countywide.
That group’s top priority is to reimburse the PUD for its work since March to install 12 WiFi hotspots around the county at a cost of $190,000.
“The general consensus is that it’s a great pool of projects to be pulling from,” Morley said. “We only wish there was more money.”
After today’s county commissioners meeting, the Intergovernmental Coordinating Committee, which includes one elected official and one chief executive from the county, the city, the PUD and the port, will meet at 5 p.m. Thursday to continue discussing allocation of CARES Act money.
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Jefferson County senior reporter Nicholas Johnson can be reached by phone at 360-417-3509 or by email at njohnson@peninsuladailynews.com.
