Project Description
- Impact of funding use regulations: One goal of this study is to review the allowed uses and controls associated with the federal government’s fiscal assistance to counties to address the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Innovative strategies: The second goal is that the study will identify and document innovative strategies using CRF resources to meet the needs of their citizens, using six county case studies. The focus will be on county needs created by the pandemic, with special attention towards inclusive economic recovery and assisting vulnerable and underserved populations with public health and economic security issues.
- “Planned to actual” spending comparisons: Finally, the study will analyze the CRF spending plans and CRF budgets of the 119 participating counties to document spending categories and allocations by category.
Recommendations
The National Association of Counties (NACo) is a nonprofit, non-partisan membership organization serving nearly 40,000 county-elected officials and 3.6 million county employees. It was founded in 1935 and unites county officials to:
- Advocate county priorities in federal policymaking
- Promote exemplary county policies and practices
- Nurture leadership skills and expand knowledge networks
- Optimize county and taxpayer resources and cost savings, and
- Enrich the public’s understanding of county government.
NACo has and continues to provide important assistance to its member counties as they respond to and deal with the pandemic. Among NACo’s first – and ongoing – areas of assistance was to help counties understand and utilize the financial support provided by Congress through the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (the CARES Act), which was enacted early in 2020 shortly after the pandemic broke out.
