Planning begins for RI to spend $2.5 billion from federal infrastructure law - WPRI.com
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) — Rhode Island officials are beginning the process of figuring out how the state should spend billions of dollars in federal funding expected to come in under the bipartisan infrastructure law, officials said Tuesday.
Brian Daniels, director of the R.I. Office of Management and Budget, told lawmakers at a Senate Finance Committee hearing that the White House published 465 pages of guidance for states earlier this week about accessing the money.
“This is an all-of-government-type initiative,” Daniels said. “We want to make sure the dollars are deployed strategically and that we’re not missing any opportunities.”
President Biden signed the infrastructure law in November. The state is expecting to receive about $2.5 billion in funding under the law, including $1.5 billion for highway projects, as well as hundreds of millions each for bridges, public transportation and water infrastructure.
Daniels said his office plans to work closely with Gov. Dan McKee’s staff and individual state agencies to determine the best way to use the infrastructure law funding — including determining which pot of federal money makes the most sense for individual projects in order to maximize its use.
The $2.5 billion infrastructure infusion — expected to flow into the state over the next five fiscal years — is the latest big round of federal funding to flow into Rhode Island since the start of the pandemic.
The House Fiscal Office estimated last year that Congress had provided Rhode Island government with $6.7 billion in pandemic relief funds since March 2020 through six different laws. (That amount excluded the infrastructure measure.) The temporary increase in federal funding has helped send the annual state budget soaring from roughly $10 billion before the pandemic to over $13 billion now.
The biggest pots of pandemic-related federal funding the state has received include $1.25 billion in 2020 from the CARES Act’s Coronavirus Relief Fund, and $1.13 billion last year from the American Rescue Plan Act’s State Fiscal Recovery Fund.
As part of the Senate Finance hearing, McKee administration officials offered updates on how much of those rounds of federal money still remains to be spent.
Lawmakers voted last month to spend an initial $119 million of the American Rescue Plan funding, and McKee put forward a proposal to spend the remaining roughly $1 billion in his newly released budget plan, which is now before the General Assembly.
Dorothy Pascale, the state controller who until recently also led the Pandemic Recovery Office, said all but $4.3 million of the $1.25 billion from the CARES Act has now been allocated, and the federal government has given states an extension until September to actually pay the money out.
The biggest chunk of the $1.25 billion was $343.5 million used to cover state personnel expenses, followed by $220.5 million for the Hospital Assistance Partnership Program that provided grants to local hospitals that lost revenue during the pandemic.
An earlier version of this story said Dorothy Pascale currently leads the Pandemic Recovery Office; she has transitioned out of that role.
source: https://www.wpri.com/news/politics/planning-begins-for-ri-to-spend-2-5-billion-from-federal-infrastructure-law/
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