The Athens-Clarke County Commission got into occasionally heated debate over how to spend federal money at its meeting Tuesday night.
The Athens-Clarke County Government has over $3 million of American Rescue Plan Act funds left to spend. The issue—only a few months remain to decide how the money will be allocated, or it will have to be returned to the federal government.
Several members of the public came forward to criticize a proposal by Commissioner Mike Hamby of District 10 that would reallocate ARPA money away from youth programming to various infrastructure projects. District Attorney Deborah Gonzalez was one speaker. She said that passage of the proposal, which would set aside $600,000 to repair courthouse elevators, would set a negative precedent.
“I work in the courthouse, I know about those elevators, I’d rather climb five sets of stairs than take money away from our children. This is telling me that we are not valuing our children.”
While several commissioners asked to table the vote until later in the month to see if money could be redirected to youth programs, District 6 Commissioner Jesse Houle reminded their colleagues of the time constraint.
“We never found a way to agree to count to 6 on additional new ideas. People can say whatever they want to say today about what we should’ve done in the past, but the reality is that we’re out of time.”
Acting County Manager Niki Jones confirmed that new contracts with youth programs would take too long to finalize.
Commissioner Hamby’s proposal, which dedicates over $400,000 to youth development programs—a significant decrease from over $3 million originally--passed narrowly, six to four.
