Change of heart? Anchorage acting mayor seeks to reallocate CARES funds

By
Suzanne Downing
-
19

DETAILS OF PLAN TO BE RELEASED FRIDAY

A measure will be introduced at a special Anchorage Assembly meeting scheduled for Friday, Dec. 4 to move already allocated CARES Act funds into different “buckets” that can be used to help residents of the city.

Acting Mayor Quinn-Davidson and members of the Anchorage Assembly announced on Thursday the measure to provide additional relief funding to businesses and residents, including housing assistance and grants to businesses, in light of the acting mayor’s devastating shut-down order that went into effect Tuesday, crushing local businesses, particularly restaurants and bars during their busy season.

The announcement by the Mayor’s Office made no mention of the $20 million in additional funds sent to the municipality by the governor, with a request from Gov. Mike Dunleavy that it be used to actually help people and businesses in need. Critics have said that the funds so far have not helped enough people in Anchorage, but have been used to prop up government jobs and build trails.

[Read: Governor provides additional CARES Act funds to Anchorage]

Assembly Resolution No. 2020-426, will be introduced and a public hearing and final vote will be set for next week.  

The $15,407,650 relief package would provide additional funding to several “oversubscribed” municipal economic relief programs, as follows: 

  • $7,400,000 for the Rental and Mortgage Assistance Program. This will allow the program to continue beyond December and into 2021. 
  • $6,407,650 for grants to small businesses impacted by the shutdown order, including restaurants, bars, and entertainment businesses. This amount is in addition to the approximately $7,000,000 remaining in the small business program fund, which will be deployed in the coming days, according to the Mayor’s press release. After passage next week, funds left to deploy to small businesses would total $13,407,650. 
  • $1 million for the municipal voucher program that provides individuals and families with vouchers for basic necessities such as groceries, medication, diapers, and gas. This will add to the existing $1,000,000 program, which Mayor Quinn-Davidson expects to be depleted this month.  
  • $600,000 for the United Way and Alaska Hospitality and Retailers Association Meals Program, which pays local restaurants to provide meals to families that are struggling to make ends meet. This funding will allow the existing program to continue beyond 2021. 

“We’ve spent the last week combing through each of the Muni programs to see what funds we could repurpose to get help to those who need it the most – and quickly,” said Acting Mayor Quinn-Davidson. “These funds are a good start, but not enough to carry our community through these next few months. We’re hopeful that Congress will act quickly to provide Alaskans the resources we need to weather this public health crisis.”  

The funding for the additional economic relief redirects dollars previously appropriated by the Anchorage Assembly.

The Anchorage Assembly previously set aside $12 million to meet the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) local match requirement for disaster funds in case the State of Alaska did not pay the match. The State of Alaska has committed to pay this match, so these funds are no longer needed for that purpose. The bulk of the remaining funds come from funds that were appropriated for “mental health crisis response,” which she said will now be funded by the alcohol tax.  

The Anchorage Assembly previously allocated over $88,000,000 for economic stimulus, the majority which has been spent on rent and mortgage relief and grants to businesses and nonprofits. The remaining relief dollars from that allocation will become available in the coming weeks, including $7 million more for small businesses, $7 million to tourism related businesses, $3 million for utility relief, and continued payments to child care providers.

19 COMMENTS

  3. Is everybody really just agreeing that the government should take care of us all? Seriously? Get out of our lives and business and let us take care of ourselves. There would be no need to pass out money the municipality doesn’t have and beg for more from Big Brother if people were just allowed to make their own decisions and take responsibility for their own lives and livelihood. This is disgusting.

    • Exactly.
      “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the Government, and I’m here to help. ” Ronald Reagan

    • The Mayor is my shepherd, I shall not want. She maketh me to hunker down in green pastures, she leadeth beside the closed businesses. She restoreth my EBT card; she leadeth in the paths of paranoia for Fauci’s sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of COVID, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me, thy masks and thy social distancing they comforteth me. Thou preparest welfare benefits before me in the presence of mine unmasked enemies; thou annoinest my head with mandates; my fear of living runneth over. Surely isolation and poverty shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of misery forever. Amen.

  4. “Government is not the solution to the problem, government IS the problem.” The Acting mayor and assembly are the very definition of the phrase. The woman created a huge problem, then points to the federal government as being responsible for solving the problem. Typical non-leader politician.

  5. what happens to all governments that run out of other peoples money, when there are more people needing assistance outweighing those actually producing wealth? They moved into America if they could ever be so lucky. The direction these Democrats are leading us toward America won’t be any better an option than living in Ukraine as the new congresswoman-elect Victoria Spartz left and decided run for congress after seeing where Democrats and Moderate Republicans were taking America. When will government welfare stop? When people stop applying for its aid? It gives you aid in exchange taking your life.

    • Diehard Marxists like these do pray to their god, George — and that god is named Thanatos, the god of death. Radical Leftism is simply a death cult, which actively seeks the death not only of individuals (and by the cruelest means possible), but the death of society itself.

  8. Respectfully, fewer pictures of the Acting Mayor on this forum would be gratefully appreciated. They give me the creeps.

    • Thank you.
      I didn’t want to be the first to mention pics of her.
      Every time I see her face here, I cannot help but think that she looks as simple minded as her utterances sound.
      She looks vacuous and inane, the perfect picture of a village idiot…..

  9. Ms. Quinn will go down as Anchorage’s most inept mayor. This sorry excuse was handed a steering wheel and she chose to drive into the ditch. Open the city. Allow those to choose their own future. .
    .

  10. Sometimes while it’s raining there is a break in the clouds and the sun shines through…could this be that time? Not if those who claim to be conservative are asked. Of course most of those who claim to be conservative couldn’t spell the word if their life depended upon it.

    • Don’t believe it will happen,,every Democratic portion of the Assembly has exhibited the ‘puppy at the bowl how much can I get away with’ syndrome. Then they do the one-eighty by deficating in your garden.

  11. When the plandemic has finally burnt itself out, or it is no longer useful for the great transformation, I would like to see an honest and open statewide accounting posted of just where all this money has gone. For the “non-profits”, I’d also like to see what went into overhead, and to what the rest was actually disbursed to. Lastly, for municipalities that took the money, we need to see where the money laundering took place, such as CARES Act money put into union wages, and then where the same amount was extracted from the actual budget, and sent somewhere else. Like what was attempted with Mayor Twerky and those Red Nose Inns he tried to buy for his indigent voting base. This all stinks.

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