Ottawa Food again ignored as Moss laments prior board's lack of transparency
OTTAWA COUNTY — The finance and administration committee of the Ottawa County Board received an update on the status of ARPA funds during a meeting Tuesday, March 5.
Director of Fiscal Services Karen Karasinski presented a timeline of the county’s ARPA funds, which totaled about $57 million, and gave an overview of what’s still available. Committee Chair Gretchen Cosby requested an audit of the funds in February.
Karasinski noted the funds are referred to as State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds or SLFRF. She said the county used a lost revenue formula listed in ARPA guidelines to allocate just over $49 million to payroll for public safety, courts, the prosecuting attorney’s office and the clerk’s office.
The funds that otherwise would've been used for payroll were then placed in “budgetary savings,” added to the board initiatives fund and used for all but one of the county’s ARPA projects. The lone exception was a childcare initiative through the Outdoor Discovery Center Network, which took the remaining $7.5 million of the $57 million allotted to the county.
Funding projects this way allowed for more flexibility in what the county could approve.
Currently, there’s $4.1 million available in the board initiatives fund. Of that, $2 million was returned from an approved project by Dwelling Place that fell through because other grants were not received.
Over $1.35 million is Medicaid cost-base reimbursement allocated to the health department to offset lost revenue during the pandemic — also returned to the fund. Another $602,968 was initially budgeted for employee bonuses, but wasn't needed and returned. The final $145,700 was never committed to a specific project.
The board discussed a housing project from Lakeshore Habitat for Humanity that still needs $400,000 in support, but it's unclear if the nonprofit is eligible.
Corporate Counsel Jack Jordan said that's because other approved housing projects involved rental units, while Habitat builds homes for private ownership. He said he’d look into it.
At the end of the discussion, Moss expressed displeasure with how the previous board handled review and approval of funding requests. An ARPA task force, which included two board members, four county staff members and around a dozen community members, reviewed proposals and made recommendations to the full board.
“It is a little concerning to me that a committee led by board members had a dozen or more closed meetings to figure out how to spend $57 million of county funds and then brought it to one open board meeting or a couple,” Moss said. “I think the entire process should have been at open meetings.
“I find it very unfortunate that the committee took requests, eliminated requests, approved some, disapproved others and eventually pulled everything up to the board. I think that was kind of how things used to work. Maybe, kind of comically, if we did that, you would never hear the end of it. That’s why we’re focused on transparency and keeping things done in the open.”
Yet again, an attempt to discuss the Ottawa Food coordinator position went ignored.
Rebekah Curran attempted to amend Tuesday’s agenda to “get an update on where we’re at, what we’re waiting on to move that forward.”
“I know there’s been a lot of discussion around that from the community,” she said.
More: Officials said 'no one' wanted Ottawa Food to be impacted. It was anyway.
The motion didn't receive a second, though Moss implied the matter might be up for discussion soon.
“Would you like a second?" he asked Cosby. "I think this item was coming up in the next meeting."
“I think it’s something that we’ve discussed before,” Cosby said.
“I would second it, if the chair would like me to. But it wasn’t on this agenda and I thought it wasn’t going to be on this agenda," Moss replied.
“Correct, I don’t think there’s been a change in status.”
Commissioners approved one staffing request, but referred another to the health and human services committee.
An administrative assistant for the Veterans Affairs Department was approved Tuesday, while a similar position for the Ottawa County Department of Public Health was moved to the health and human services committee, which next meets March 19.
Veterans Affairs Director Jason Schenkel said the new position will help provide coverage in the department, where he's currently the only full-time staff member. The total cost, including benefits, is $97,211.
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The OCDPH position would bring a new staff member to the environmental health division to assist with, in part, permits and licenses. It would be paid for entirely through state funds.
Moss suggested moving the request to the health and human services committee, which was approved. He also indicated an interest in making point-of-sale well and septic inspections open to private inspectors, instead of solely county employees.
“Right now, there’s really a county monopoly on the inspection process,” he said. “I’d love to see at least options for opening that up a little bit. Maybe a release valve for some of the work internally, and just look to see if we can reduce wait times, reduce fees for residents and then also bring whatever additional resources are needed into the department.”
— Contact reporter Mitchell Boatman at mboatman@hollandsentinel.com.
This article originally appeared on The Holland Sentinel: Ottawa Food again ignored as Moss laments prior board's lack of transparency
