Welcome to all of our guests and thank you all for being here with us today.

Council, as we get started, could I get a motion on our minutes from our previous meeting?

All right.

The minutes will stand as published.

We do have a couple of discussions today, and as we um get ready for those and for our meeting this afternoon at 3 30, which is quite busy since we were off uh last week.

Um I look forward to having a good discussion and debate of ideas um in which we just treat each other with uh respect and courtesy and I hope that's something we'll each of us uh commit ourselves to each time we gather together.

So in that spirit, uh we will get started here.

Our first topic this afternoon is a discussion of the allocation and reallocation of ARPA funds.

Um we have Weston and Kevin here for that.

I know that um over the past few months several of us have had questions about different aspects of uh ARPA funds and who they went to and how much is left and have they been reallocated and all those sorts of things.

So um I've asked them to be here today to kind of answer some of those questions and to give an overview of where we are in terms of uh spending those monies in general.

Absolutely.

Well thank you uh Chairman Davis for the opportunity.

Well we have prepared for uh to get us going in the conversation just a high level presentation that finance put together.

We also have um Shelby Glover here with us who um can help answer any questions as they come up, but I'll let Weston get us started.

Sure.

So just a kind of a like Kevin said, a quick high-level overview of ARPA.

So original ARP award was 38.6 million dollars.

8.6 of that went to some specific things like the airport and um some COVID-related uh health things, um, some administrative compliance type costs and and some specific nonprofit allocations, but then $30 million was set aside um for the one Chattanooga relief and recovery plan.

And with that set aside was eight eight priority uh areas uh with a number of different recipients and some internal programs.

Uh those eight areas were uh homelessness, workforce development, affordable rental, affordable homeownership, entrepreneurship, mental health, public safety, and early learning.

And just as a quick aside, uh if you go to the city's website, there is actually a webpage dedicated to that.

So if you want more information on it, you can kind of drill down into each one of those uh different buckets, and there's some additional resources at the bottom of that too.

So um if you want more information on that, that relief and recovery plan uh there are on our website.

Um all those programs of the 38.6 million dollars.

We have a few things that are still hanging out.

Most all of that money has been spent um and it's been put to put to put to work.

Um but these these few things are still outstanding.

So um the 1.5 million, I think we had some questions around this, uh allocated to the enterprise center to expand the Hamilton County School's Ed Connect program.

And so the Ed Connect program was originally set up to provide connectivity to students uh when we were during COVID in that that um digital learning environment that we were in where folks were having to do Zoom school and it was a kind of a crazy time.

That Hamilton County Schools, EPB set up this program to connect um lower income neighborhoods to the internet in order for them to do schooling uh in in the right way.

And this 1.5 million is an extension of that that is intended to fund connectivity at the west side developments that is is underway across town.

Yeah, and point of clarity on this, which um the Enterprise Center and EPB helped me come to appreciate is that while this is modeled after um HCS Ed Connect powered by EPB, it is it's not the same program.

It's just it's it's digital connectivity for these targeted communities in the West Side.

Um, and I have some stats here about who is um who's gonna be the beneficiary.

So it's 566 units um in in one west side.

Uh it's public Wi-Fi access at James A.

Henry Hub and in other public locations at one west side.

It's in-home access for approximately 876 units in the Emma Wheeler homes, Dogwood Manor, and Mary Walker Tower, supporting older adults and um Chattanooga Housing Authority Managed Housing.

And then it's also expanded public Wi-Fi access in um in other neighborhoods and bus stops and community informed locations in Chattanooga.

I can get that full list from the Enterprise Center, but I don't have it in that write-up.

And so that's what that 1.5 is.

We are um we do have an agreement with the Enterprise Center, and that is they're actively working to spend that money right now.

So that project is is underway.

Um they haven't spent it yet, but they are working on it.

Um the 2.8 million for the low barrier shelter.

Um that is money set aside for that that purpose.

I don't, as far as I'm aware, there is no set plan for what that looks like.

I think actually I saw on the agenda today that you guys may be discussing that in a meeting coming up in August.

Um, but that was money set aside for the purpose of a low barrier shelter.

Uh the Chamber Foundation Chat 2.0, Chetnuga Future Fund, that $900,000.

That's actually on future considerations this week, so you'll see it.

Um if you I think it was added today or yesterday, it was it was a late edition.

So uh you should see it if you haven't already.

That money is um for the savings accounts for kindergarten, first grade, and middle school age uh students, I believe, through chat 2.0 and the uh chat future fund.

Um and so we that was supposed to be paid out over a number of years.

We've decided let's just go ahead and give them those funds so that we can kind of clean clear the books of it and just go ahead and get it out into community.

And then 125,000, that was related to the extended hours at James A.

Uh Henry.

So that that was taken care of in the 27th budget.