Members vote to amend ARPA plan, allocate $10M for revenue replacement

The Lake County Board of Commissioners approved Wednesday an amended American Rescue Plan Act funds plan to allocate $10 million for revenue replacement.

In March, the council approved a resolution to allocate $5 million of American Rescue Plan Act funds to the City of Crown Point for wastewater projects. But, officials with the commissioners said the allocation of the funds goes against federal guidance and the State Board of Accounts memorandum for spending ARPA funds.

The memorandum states the “ARP grant fund must be established by ordinance of the County Commissioners.” The funds “must be appropriated by the fiscal body before use in accordance with ... the ordinance and the plan,” the memorandum continues.

Lake County received about $94 million in funds through ARPA, and in October the commissioners heard proposals for sewer projects that would use up the funds, said board president Commissioner Michael Repay, D-3rd.

The commissioners passed a plan late last year that identified two sewer infrastructure improvement projects in unincorporated Calumet Township and Center Township, Repay said.

Repay said the projects in the commissioner’s ARPA spending plan are underway and in the engineering stages. For the $5 million to be spent on the Crown Point project, Repay said it would have to be included in the commissioners’ ARPA spending plan.

But, Repay said the U.S. Treasury rules state that up to $10 million of ARPA funds is allowed to go toward revenue replacement. The amended plan allows the council to use the $10 million for revenue replacement from the county’s self insurance fund, a fund that typically covers employee health claims or liability claims, he said.

While the $10 million will go into the self insurance funds, it means that $5 million of ARPA funds couldn’t directly go into a Crown Point sewer project, Repay said. But, because the council won’t have to move money into the self insurance fund because of the $10 million ARPA funding, theoretically the council can move up to $10 million into different parts of the budget, he said.

“You can see where, at the end of the year, stuff gets plugged into those funds typically anyway, so that’s a fund that will not have to get plugged in. That’s $10 million that will not have to get plugged in,” Repay said.

But, Councilman Christian Jorgensen, R-St. John, who worked on the council resolution, said it won’t be possible for $5 million of the $10 million to be allocated to the Crown Point sewer project because the $10 million will be divided between the seven council members for infrastructure projects for their districts.

For Jorgensen’s portion of the funds, he said he’s securing $1.1 million of the ARPA funds to be spent on a sewer project in Lowell.

The resolution for $5 million in ARPA funds is “a battle ground for the council and the commissioners,” Jorgensen said.

During the meeting, the commissioners also approved in a 3-0 vote contracts with Federal Signal for upfitting 18 marked and six unmarked police vehicles. The marked vehicles will cost $239,498.10 total and the unmarked vehicles will cost $51,172.80 total.