She applied for $601,000 in grant money from the Ohio Department of Health to share with the health departments in Hamilton and Middletown and has asked the county commissioners for $269,000. The added staff members are needed as cases grow, she said.
“New cases require the same amount of intense investigation, isolation, quarantine, and follow-up as was needed at the beginning of the outbreak” she said.
As of Friday, there have been 33 deaths and 1,065 confirmed cases of coronavirus in Butler County since March 11. The added staff will also help as businesses adjust to reopening.
“We also look forward to using supplemental staff to continue to educate the public on safe reopening, and to take proactive steps to prevent the disease from gaining a foothold in our communities,” Bailer said. “Working in ‘hot spots’ to decrease COVID’s spread is an important part of what we do behind the scenes every day.”
RELATED: Butler County expecting $3M in coronavirus funding
Late Thursday night the state legislature passed a $350 million coronavirus relief bill that will help pay for many expenses local governments have incurred dealing with the coronavirus. Jon Honek, senior policy analyst with the County Commissioners Association of Ohio, said the money can also be used for other fallout from the pandemic.
“The funds can also be used to establish small business grant programs to assist companies that experienced COVID-19-related business interruptions, and to enhance social services to help individuals who lost their jobs,” Honek said. “County governments will use these funds to boost the economic recovery in their communities.”
When the federal government approved the $2 trillion CARES Act in late March local governments were largely left out of the relief funding. In Ohio, only governments with populations higher than 500,000 — Cuyahoga, Franklin, Hamilton, Montgomery and Summit counties and the city of Columbus — were eligible. Butler County has about 400,000 residents.
Butler County Administrator Judi Boyko estimates the county will receive about $3 million in CARES funding. Her office has spent about $90,000 dealing with pandemic but the $3 million will also help pay for Bailer’s request and expenses by other county offices. She was waiting to see the outcome of the state’s relief package before applying for reimbursement from other sources.
Other jurisdictions will also receive state funds, but those figures were not yet available.
The CARES Act money is restricted to costs associated with the coronavirus and can’t be used for other purposes. The city of Hamilton has incurred $187,777 dealing with the pandemic. Finance Director David Jones said $88,950 was spent on keeping a fourth medic unit staffed from March 15 through June 3 and the rest was for non-payroll expenses.
He said the the city has been allocated $855,817 from the Community Development Block Grant CARES Act funding but has not received formal approval.
“We appreciate any assistance the state and federal governments can provide,” Jones said. “However, we would also appreciate if the money could be treated as general funds, versus restricted funds. That flexibility would allow us to use those dollars in different ways to augment our public safety efforts.”
State Rep. George Lang (R-West Chester Twp.) said another pending bill allows limited use of tax increment financing to help fund roads and public safety.
“If a TIF fund has money that is available and unencumbered, those things are both very important, it has to be money that has already been collected not money to be collected and it has to be money that is not earmarked for debt service,” Lang said. “What it will allow is those municipalities that have a TIF district to take up to 25 percent for the next two years to use only for police, fire, roads and emergency medical technicians.”
The TIF option came as part of a police and fire levy discussion in West Chester Twp. last week. Finance Director Ken Keim worried the TIFs would have to be re-paid, but Lang told the Journal-News the answer was no.
Middletown has incurred $41,150 in COVID-19 expenses through May, not including items that have been charged to the city’s purchasing credit card. The city has already secured $192,062 in funding from a variety of sources like the Department of Health and Human Services and $69,000 for the airport.
Finance Director Jake Burton said $76,638 is coming from the U.S. Department of Justice. It is a reimbursable grant so all the money hasn’t been spent yet but will be. Valid expenses include cleaning supplies, a deep clean event in jail/police department, extra labor for cleaning, materials and time.
Burton said of the expenses there’s “more to come, and obviously the bigger impact on the city is loss of revenue rather than increased expenditures.”
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