The Biden administration on Monday began to distribute $350 billion to state and local governments from his $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill — with $12.7 billion going to New York state alone and bil🐻lions more flowing to cities and counties.
New York City is getting $4.3 billion.
But the money comes with strings attached — the Treasury Department has a list of “eligible uses” that states and localities must adhere to.
Officials said the funds must be spent on public health, to counteract the negative economic effects✤ of the pandemic, to replace lost public ♓sector revenue, to provide bonus pay for essential workers and for water, sewer or broadband internet projects.
The amount of money going to New York’s state government wasn’t a surprise. It is consistent with what was before President Biden’s stimulus bill was passed by majority Democrats — with no Republican ♌support — in March.
Each of New York’s cities and counties also get a windfall of cash. In addition to the Big Apple’s $4.3 billion, Albany gets $80 million and Buffalo gets $331 million. Additional funding for boroughs — from a pool allocated for each county in the state — pushes New York City’s total appropriation close to $6 billion.
“It’s exciting” said Mayor Bill de Blasio’s spokesman Bill Neidhardt about the launch. He added that the mayor planned his executive budget around the funds.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who w🎶as influential in crafting the stimulus bill, called t🐼he Treasury Department on Monday to urge the quick distribution of funds to New York, his spokesman Angelo Roefaro told The Post.
“After fighting this pandemic on the frontlines, state and local governments in New York and across the country were loud and clear: they needed help and they needed it quickly to keep frontline workers on the job and prevent brutal service cuts,” Schumer said in a statement.
“The Treasury Department’s flexible guidance is just what is needed to help get states and municipalities the resources and funding they need to prevent layoffs, to keep essential services running, and to keep our Main Streets alive and able to rebound as we increase vaccinations and emerge from the pandemic,” Schumer said.
Biden administration officials told reporters that restrictions announced on Monday are meant to ensure🎃 that the will of Congress is upheld in putting the funds toward relevant uses.
Republicans last year blocked some state and local aid, arguing it amounted to a bailout of poorly run Democratic states that h⭕ad long-runn🦂ing deficits, citing New York as an example.
Funds cann💖ot be used by states to finance tax cuts or make pension fund deposits, the Treasury Department said. They also cannot pay for long-planned infrastructure projects unrelated to water and broadband. The use of funds must be reported to the federal government.
On a background call with reporters, an official said the funds can be used through 2024 — and there could be broad justifica🌳tions invoking ra🤡cial disparities, such as in health and education, if those gaps worsened during the pandemic.
But the rules broadly mean that governments can only offset financial holes in budgets that🅰 were created by COVID-19, officials said.
The “eligible uses” are broad enough, however, that states like California that are reporting𓃲 budget surpluses can still use their money. An official told reporters on a background call that the Golden State, for example, could put its $27 billion toward addressing homelessness.
The local government funds will be delivered in two tranches. Half will be delivered this month and another batch will come in 12 months, even though that’s after the pandemic is expected to end in the US.
For states, the delivery is ༺more complicated and states with lower rates of unemployment must wait to receive half of their funds.
“States that have experienced a net increase in the unemployment rate of more than 2 percentage points from February 2020 to the latest available data as of the date of certification will receive their full allocation of funds in a single payment; other states will receive funds in two equal tranches,” the Treasury Department said.
Carl Campanile contributed to this report.
