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Town, village residents to discuss ARPA spending in April 13 forum

By Patrick Adrian
EAGLE TIMES STAFF
ROCKINGHAM, Vt. — Town and village residents will be able to weigh in on a spending proposal of federal funds sent to their local communities at a public forum scheduled on Wednesday, April 13.

In March, Rockingham received a combined $1.45 million in federal funds from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), with the town of Rockingham to receive $441,534, Bellows Falls to receive $886,356, and Saxtons River to receive $148,239, according to Rockingham Director of Development Gary Fox.

Signed into law in March 2021, the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) provides $350 billion in additional funding for state and local governments to facilitate recovery from the adverse impacts of the pandemic and its correlating economic fallout.

The sum includes $195 billion in state funding and $130 billion in local funding, with the local portion split evenly between cities and counties, using data such as population to calculate the individual distributions.

Unlike previous federal economic relief programs, ARPA allows greater flexibility to its recipients regarding how to spend the money, whether for infrastructure investments, economic development, compensation to essential workers or revenue replacement to government services that were stressed during the pandemic.

In addition, ARPA funds are meant for long-term benefit rather than an immediate stimulus boost, Fox explained last week on The Feed, a community news show on Falls Area Community Television (FACT TV).

“Most of the pandemic relief programs were designed to get money into the communities quickly,” Fox said. “[ARPA] is ‘slow money,’ the total opposite. The legislators want the spending to be thoughtful, so much that they put in provisions for community input and consensus.”

To further encourage deliberation, governing bodies have until the end of 2024 to decide how they will spend their allotted funds.

Rockingham has taken its community-input seeking to a level beyond that of many towns in the region through the organization of public forums.

The town held its first forum on Wednesday, March 16, which drew 50 residents in person and additional participants on Zoom. Fox said the first forum focused heavily on revisiting the community’s “vision” while factoring in new needs or priorities introduced during the pandemic.

That vision, developed prior to the ongoing novel coronavirus pandemic, is a one-page community outline that will help facilitate the consideration of proposed projects. The vision states Rockingham’s commitment to providing a high quality of life, economic and cultural vitality and accessibility and opportunity to all residents.

On Tuesday, the Rockingham Development Board is publishing an organized list of proposed spending projects that residents, organizations and stakeholders have submitted during the past couple of months, “so people will be able to see them ahead of the April 13 meeting,” Fox said.

The list includes 60 submitted proposals that range in scope and cost, Fox said, from funding educational guides for local historical sites to extensive, multi-year projects.

One larger proposal, Fox said, is the Connecticut River Heritage Center, a proposed project to restore and repurpose Rockingham’s historic paper mill buildings as a hub for businesses and tourism.

The projects have been sorted by village or community, so attendees of the upcoming meeting will be grouped according to residency to discuss the projects tied to their community, Fox explained.

The list of proposed projects may be found on the Rockingham town website or local community Facebook pages.

The forum will be held at Rockingham Town Hall on Wednesday, April 13, at 6:30 p.m.

reporter @eagletimes.com

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