Last-minute law change could mean more COVID relief and grocery cards

Congress waived the Dec. 30 deadline for spending CARES Act dollars. Now Miami-Dade can decide whether to use the money to help the county budget or provide more relief

A last-minute reprieve from Congress could mean millions of dollars in business aid, food stipends and other economic relief for Miami-Dade residents if the county’s strained budget doesn’t first absorb the remaining CARES Act dollars that were set to be frozen on Wednesday.

The stimulus bill that President

Donald Trump signed into law on Sunday added a full year to the time local and state governments have to spend their allocations from the CARES Act — legislation passed in March that sent

$474 million in relief money to MiamiDade.

A central string attached to the

money was that it could only cover expenses in 2020, a rule that saw Miami-Dade cities scrambling to get their slices of the county CARES pie spent this month. That strategy sparked a blitz of grocery-card giveaways as the fastest method of getting the federal dollars spent by year’s end.

Miami-Dade had planned on applying unspent CARES dollars toward at least $64 million of its own county expenses eligible for COVID relief, such as police enforcing emergency public health orders and parks staff used for food distribution centers.

Now that Congress has granted more leeway on spending the money, Miami-Dade commissioners can choose between providing more relief or using the CARES Act dollars to ease strain brought on by the COVID-19 economic downturn.

“We can help our budget, which helps our taxpayers,” said Ed Marquez, the chief finance officer under Mayor Daniella Levine Cava. “The board has its options going forward.”

OTHER MAYORS ASKING FOR ADDITIONAL AID

City leaders are already asking for more dollars to extend programs they had rushed to wrap up in December.

In Hialeah, the city secured $4 million from Miami-Dade for relief efforts, and distributed all of it. Some went to grants for small businesses and for rent relief, and some went to a giveaway for grocery cards launched as the deadline approached. “It was a Hail Mary,” said Paul Hernandez, a member of the city council.

Mayor Carlos Hernandez said Hialeah would welcome more time and dollars to tackle COVID needs into 2021. “We could have used more to really help our citizens,” he said. “We were limited in what were able to do.”

In Florida City, 40% of its nearly 12,000 residents live in poverty, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Because the need is so great, the CARES dollars were quickly used up without much left over, Mayor Otis Wallace said. He called the deadlines “unrealistically tight.”

“We still buckled down and met them,” Wallace said. All $780,000 of business assistance and $200,000 of rental and mortgage assistance will be used by the year’s end, he said.

In Pinecrest, a program to cover some rent expenses for struggling businesses went through the $230,000 granted from Miami-Dade, said Mayor Joseph Corradino. “We spent all we were allocated but couldn’t satisfy the need,” he said. “With an extended deadline, we can reissue the request.”

COUNTY COMMISSIONERS’ PRIORITIES

In November, MiamiDade commissioners passed a resolution to apply any unspent CARES dollars at the end of 2020 on county expenses. That legislation was passed before the deadline extension was approved in Washington, but commissioners could still stick with that approach.

Joe Martinez, the commissioner who sponsored the legislation, said Monday he hopes Miami-Dade will use the remaining CARES money to stabilize the county’s budget. If not, “we will suffer in September” when commissioners must approve the 2022 budget. “Being fiscally prudent is not the easy route,” he said.

Commissioner Raquel Regalado, an advocate for more rental relief, said she doesn’t want COVID-19 relief to be caught up in dire predictions about the 2022 budget.

“The majority of the board has really bought into this idea that if we don’t do this, we have to raise taxes,” she said of using CARES money to plug budget holes. “I don’t agree with that. I think there is plenty of time to readjust.”

It’s unclear how much CARES money will be left over once 2021 begins. A Dec. 7 analysis by the county’s finance department showed about

$64 million unspent in all programs, but that was easily wiped out by more than $160 million tied to county COVID-19 expenses.

While it fell short of the second round of relief for local and state governments, the new stimulus bill does include about

$25 billion for rent relief. It’s available to local governments with populations of at least 200,000, meaning Miami and Hialeah should qualify for dollars on top of what Miami-Dade receives.

That could lessen pressure on remaining CARES Act dollars, which paid for several county and city rent-relief programs.

“We’re glad to see that money finally coming down,” said Alana Greer, director of the Community Justice Project, an advocate for helping tenants in the Miami area. “It’s needed.”