Kenai Peninsula Borough Mayor Charlie Pierce gave a breakdown on the borough’s share of Federal CARES Act funding during a Facebook Live event on Friday morning. Mayor Pierce clarified the proposed sum of money headed to the borough as $37.4 million.
Of that sum, the Mayor said there is a large sum of money available to community groups, but each respective group securing the money is not guaranteed: “Some have said approximately $13 million will potentially, and I emphasize the word ‘potentially,’ remember that – potentially, will go to a number of community assistance programs. What do you have to do? These agencies and entities will have the qualify for the money and what is it going to take to qualify? Well, you’ll be talking to Brenda Ahlberg and she’s going to give you the highlights and go over the requirements. Currently, the administration is working with Brenda and our legal department is trying to determine those federal regulations.”
He emphasized that the money must be spent or it will be lost, and it must be spent correctly, so expect the borough to be very cautious: “It’s very, very important that we get it right, because if we don’t get it right, we have to pay it back and we have to pay it back with interest so we’re not going to be disseminating any dollars through the borough to you any time soon without #1: knowing what the regulations say, and #2: you have to qualify, you need to meet the minimum qualifications to receive the money. You’ll ask me, what are those qualifications, well, we’re trying to determine what those are. We’re getting those from the federal register, from the federal regulatory commissions.”
Mayor Pierce says one known caveat involved with the money is that all requests must be COVID-19 related, where the pandemic caused a loss of revenue or where costs-of-operation for businesses increased.
