When the federal government drops $26.4 million in your lap, you’ve got to be careful how you spend it.
Jefferson County will receive $26,406,492 through the federal CARES (Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security) Act to help pay for expenses dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic, and after weeks of discussion and a lot of scrutiny, the county is allowing local governments, schools, nonprofit organizations and businesses to apply for grants.
The application process already has opened for local governments, like cities, the Health Department, and fire and ambulance districts, as well as schools, both public and private. They may apply through a portal set up on the county’s
website, jeffcomo.org, through Oct. 5.
Applications for businesses and nonprofits will be available beginning Monday, Aug. 17, through the Jefferson County Economic Development Corporation site at jeffcountymo.org, with a link provided on the county’s website.
A deadline for those applications has been set for Sept. 8.
“Those deadlines can be extended if necessary,” County Executive Dennis Gannon said.
Leah Smith, Gannon’s executive assistant who has helped plan and develop the applications, said applicants should be prepared to show proof of any expenses included in the applications.
“Everything will be checked,” she said.
Grants are to cover unexpected costs public and private entities spend to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic, Gannon stressed.
“These are unexpected costs,” he said. “If you have to buy PPEs, for instance. We are not allowed to make up for losses of business or tax revenue. Personnel costs can be included if you’re having to hire or reassign a current employee to do something COVID-related, like we are stationing our staff to monitor temperatures at the doors of county buildings.”
Applicants must list expenditures in general categories including medical expenses and public health expenses and certify they are seeking reimbursement for an expenditure only once.
“Under the federal guidelines for this money, no one is allowed to double-dip,” said County Counselor Wes Yates. “At the beginning, we were unsure whether any entity that received any money for anything would be allowed to apply, but we’ve been instructed that is allowed, as long as you’re not asking for a double payment. If, say, you’ve received $75,000 to buy PPEs (personal protective equipment) and you’ve spent $100,000 on them, you’re allowed to apply with us for the difference.”
Governmental entities will be required to submit their 2020 budget to ensure any expenses on their applications were not budgeted, Auditor Kristy Apprill said.
Applications from governments and schools will first be vetted by Smith and then Apprill before going to a board that includes them plus Gannon, Yates, EDC executive director Todd Tracy, Director of Administration David Courtway and Warren Robinson, emergency management director.
Applications accepted by the board will then be included in an ordinance that must be approved by the County Council.
The process will vary slightly for business and nonprofit organizations, which first will be vetted by EDC employees before going to Apprill and then the board and then the council
Business applications, Tracy said, will take two forms.
Business Safe grants, for up to $5,000, will cover mainly costs for PPE.
Small Business and Nonprofit Emergency grants will top out at $25,000 and will cover other expenses to deal with the coronavirus, but cannot include lost revenue.
Gannon said only Jefferson County-based businesses will be considered for either grant.
“They have to have between four and 50 full-time equivalent employees,” he said. “This cuts out the pure mom-and-pops, and chains will not be eligible.”
All payments, Gannon said, will be made electronically.
The lag between the announcement of the money and the applications going online could not be avoided, Yates said.
“The original document dealing with this money – how we can distribute it – was 850-some-odd pages,” Yates said. “And there are new directives coming from the Treasury Department all the time on how this is to be managed. We were going to allow schools to apply for expenses to improve broadband coverage, and then we found out the federal government is going to offer a separate program for that, so we had to take that out. That was happening every week. We’d get together, and something fundamental had changed.”
Yates said he and the rest of the advisory panel have taken every precaution to ensure they are crafting applications and distributing money properly.
“Someone, somewhere will probably go to jail because they mishandled their money, but it’s not going to be anyone from Jefferson County,” Yates said.
Because of the complexity of the CARES Act, Yates requested and the Jefferson County Council agreed to hire John A. Young of the St. Charles law firm of Hamilton Weber LLC to advise him on this matter.
The council voted unanimously June 8 to award a contract to the law firm, which will bill the county Young’s going rate of $275 per hour.
If other attorneys or paralegals with the firm are used, their rates will prevail, from $130 for a paralegal to $335 for a senior partner.
“He (Young) had already done some work on this, and we had to get someone on board quickly,” Yates said. “The money has to be distributed by Dec. 31.”
The emergency situation did not lend itself to a competitive bidding process, Yates said.
“I have the statutory authority to hire outside counsel when necessary without seeking requests,” he said. “Under the circumstances, and with expertise in the subject fairly limited, this seemed like the prudent course.
“We haven’t used them a lot, but they have proven useful.”
Any money paid to the firm will come from the $26.4 million from the CARES Act.
“It’s an unanticipated, unbudgeted expense that clearly is a result of the COVID pandemic,” Yates said.
