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Counties begin to apply to state for CARES Act funding

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The Kanawha County Commission has submitted a grant application to the state for Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) act funding one of the first counties to do so.

Kanawha County Commission President Kent Carper

Commission President Kent Carper appeared on Monday’s MetroNews ‘Talkline’ to discuss how the virus has affected the county which has resulted in lost revenues in excess of $1.6 million and more than $1.5 million in expenses directly attributable to COVID-19.

The CARES Act provided more than $2 trillion in economic relief, including a direct payment of $1.25 billion to the state. Local governments around the state were able to file CARES grant applications on Friday evening.

Gov. Jim Justice said Monday he wants other counties and municipalities to apply for the funding.

“Now that application is out there and I encourage all of the cities and the counties to apply,” Justice said at his daily media briefing. “As we get applications and we can work our way through them and we find things they qualify for we will get hat money to them immediately.”

Expenses in the Kanawha County due to COVID-19 have been about safety, Carper said. The county has purchased six locally made machines at $2,400 each that is meant to take temperatures before people can enter a building. He said that is what helped stop a spread at the Metro 911 center last week.

Other spending, according to Carper, included $70,000 cleaning the judicial building after an outbreak of the virus in March.

“Someone said ‘Why would you do that for?’” Well at the time it was absolutely unknown how long the virus would stay on the surface. We were trying to reenter the building so we hired a professional cleaning service,” Carper said on ‘Talkline.’

“Today we would probably use the Guard. Today we might do something different but that wasn’t today that was two months ago.”

Current guidance from the federal government will allow the state to reimburse cities and counties for direct expenses but revenue lost, which Kanawha County puts at $1.6 million, is not yet allowed for reimbursement. Justice said counties and cities should make that part of their application anyway.

Gov. Jim Justice

“As we go forward and those guidelines are relaxed, we’ll be able to backfill and you’ll be able to retroactively go back and pick up additional dollars, significant dollars,” Justice said.

Carper said if his county does receive money for lost revenue, drastic measures may have to be taken.

“At some point we will have to do what they are doing in Hancock County, what they have done in Fairmont and other places. There would be a reduction in government services that will be hurtful to public safety,” he said.

Carper said businesses in his county were on a razor-thin margin before the pandemic hit and this has made it much worse. Carper said while he hopes he is wrong, he could see nearly 20 percent of businesses possibly closing for good.

“The service industry is the one that has been hit the worst. The question is how long will it take them to come back, will they come back or will they go out of business creating eventually more empty buildings. Let’s face it, we were in tough times before this,” Carper said.





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