Counties start spending ARPA windfalls
Jul. 10—In Hillsborough County, the county-run nursing home is in line for an estimated $10 million HVAC system.
In Cheshire County, the 21 Bar & Grill in Keene will get a $20,000 check to help recover from its pandemic-related business slump.
In Grafton County, officials plan to devote $1.9 million in federal funds to offset a 7% tax increase.
All are examples of how New Hampshire counties, long the overlooked division of Granite State politics, are spending millions they have received under President Joe Biden's $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan.
In total, ARPA funding for New Hampshire counties amounts to $263 million, one-third more than the $194 million that collectively went to New Hampshire cities and towns.
Unlike most federal money, it comes with few strings — only the general requirement that it be spent to address pandemic-related matters or economic harm related to the pandemic.
With a little creativity, officials are finding ways to spend money on projects that range from new buildings (more space for social distancing), to weight rooms for jail inmates (address pandemic-ravaged mental health) to weekly stipend checks for frontline workers (victims of the pandemic economy).
Last month, counties finalized their annual budgets, and some of those spending plans included the use of ARPA funds for a host of projects.
"You have 10 different counties and you'll have 10 different approaches (to spending the money)," said Charles Arlinghaus, the state commissioner of Administrative Services whose job involves monitoring how New Hampshire state government spends its ARPA funds.
His responsibilities don't extend down to county government, but he said counties, like other government entities, will face Treasury Department audits to make sure the ARPA money is properly spent.
"The list of eligible uses for the money is pretty broad. Yes, there will be some nexus to COVID, but in some instances it will be kind of attenuated," said an aide in the office of U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., who played a role in writing the ARPA law.
In his 10 years in county government, Rockingham County Commission Chairman Tom Tombarello has never seen such an infusion of federal funds.
"Not like this," he said. "Rockingham County getting $60 million. You don't often get that chance."
Plenty of capital ideas
When one-time federal money becomes available, capital expenses are one of the first things officials consider, Arlinghaus said. That includes new construction, previously deferred maintenance and upgrades to existing buildings.
Among the most popular upgrades are new heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems — on the grounds that they will combat the airborne coronavirus.
"The pandemic made us all look at that. Air is good," Arlinghaus said.
At Hillsborough County, plans are on the books to replace the window-mounted air conditioners at the 47-year-old nursing home with a central air system. Initial estimates put the cost at $10 million.
"The goal is to further improve air quality while mitigating risk of airborne pathogen transmission," Hillsborough County Administrator Chad Monier said in an email.
In an even bigger project, Rockingham County is devoting $30 million of ARPA money toward construction of a $68 million county administration building in Brentwood.
Tombarello said county officials had been weighing the need for a new building for years. When ARPA money became available, they realized there would be no better opportunity to build.
Still, it had to be justified.
Tombarello said the ARPA money is used for the infrastructure associated with the project, such as water and sewer lines. A $10 million, 13-acre solar array will power all county buildings and generate revenues through sales of energy tax credits. The project is eligible under the revenue replacement category of ARPA funding.
And the new offices will have lots of worker space, rectifying the unhealthy air and cramped spaces at the existing County Attorney office.
"You have to use it on items approved for ARPA funding. You can't go buy a helicopter," Tombarello said.
He said county officials ran their ideas by Shaheen's office before moving forward.
Few limits on funds
Shaheen's office said it can't approve or deny projects, but it can point an official in the right direction and share the latest updates to criteria established by the Treasury Department.
"The need exists. It's just understanding the parameters of what you can do with the funding," a Shaheen representative said.
Shaheen played a key role in developing the ARPA law. It goes as far as allowing counties, the state and local government to transfer funds to one another. In a few cases, small New Hampshire towns have turned their ARPA grant over to the county, the office said.
Money can be granted to nonprofits too. Hillsborough County, for example, has reserved about $21 million for grants to benefit traditionally underserved populations, such as low-income people and minorities.
"What I consistently heard from local leaders was the critical need for flexibility to respond to the most pressing needs on the ground," Shaheen said in remarks distributed by her office.
She said ARPA is being used to boost cash-strapped local budgets, support frontline workers and maintain basic services. ARPA proved essential in avoiding a nationwide recession, she said.
The only spending caveats are that the money cannot be used to shore up public-employee pension funds or to cut taxes, though Republican governors in more than a dozen states have gone to court to fight the proscription and have prevailed in several cases already.
A little extra in paychecks
Another item popular with several counties is worker pay.
Cheshire County boosted its starting hourly pay to $15.
In Rockingham County, full-time employees are receiving semi-annual bonuses for three years. The bonuses work out to about $1,250 for frontline workers and $1,000 for all others.
In Hillsborough County, ARPA is funding weekly and monthly stipends to nursing home workers (maximum of $250 a week) and jail workers (maximum of $200 a week). Other county workers get semi-annual bonuses of $600 or $1,200.
The hefty grants to counties reflect the fact that in many other parts of the country, counties play a more extensive role than in New England. County government elsewhere provides services such as schools, hospital care, roads, fire protection, economic development and law enforcement.
Counties are virtually non-existent in Vermont, Connecticut and Rhode Island, and they were written out of the ARPA law. But New Hampshire and neighboring Maine, whose counties are similar in structure, fell into the full-fledged county category.
Sometimes hard to track
A New Hampshire Union Leader review found wide disparities between counties in how much they disclose about their ARPA spending, as well as their regular finances.
The state's largest county, Hillsborough County, is the most transparent. It has posted online the amount of its ARPA funds expenditures so far, though it does not drill down to the nitty gritty, such as the size of worker stipends.
Hillsborough County also devoted ARPA money to hire a $137,000-a-year administrator who oversees ARPA funding.
Merrimack and Belknap counties have ARPA plans on their website and report some of their spending.
Cheshire County has devoted a Facebook page to ARPA spending. It includes pictures of smiling grant recipients — including for-profit companies — holding oversized checks. But the page does not include actual spreadsheets or financial reporting.
Carroll County has no links to ARPA funding or plans on its website. But website searches for ARPA show it mentioned in agendas and commissioner-meeting minutes.
Strafford County makes only the slightest mention of ARPA on its website. ARPA funding is mentioned four times in the most recent budget document, the 2022 fiscal year budget, which runs July 1 to June 30.
In Sullivan County, a search for ARPA had two hits. Both involved the potential use of ARPA money to fund a $35 million remodeling of the county jail.
