The following announcement was provided by Watertown Forward:
Watertown Forward is very excited to present its next City Chat on the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA). Watertown has a once in a life time opportunity to spend $10.5 million on projects that are within the federal guidelines in the ARPA. The City Chat will take place on this coming Sunday, January 22 at 4:30 p.m. It will be a Zoom meeting. Here is the link to the meeting.
We promise that you will walk away with important information about the funds, how they can be used, and how your ideas can be considered by the City. To do this we are fortunate to have two excellent guest speakers, Watertown resident, Dr. Jared Knowles and District City Councilor Emily Izzo.
Dr. Knowles is the founder of Civilytics and an expert on improving the quality, depth, and accessibility of information on government performance and civic life. He has presented and written about numerous federal funding programs and trained hundreds of policy makers and advocates about ARPA.
He will address the following topics:
• What is ARPA? What can it be spent on? What is off limits?
• What are the general guidelines? How many communities have spent their allocation? What have other communities like Watertown done?
Councilor Izzo is in her first term as the District D Councilor and is a member of the Council’s Committee on Budget and Fiscal Oversight which is holding committee meetings to discuss ARPA.
She will address:
• What is the process for allocation? What proposals has the Committee received and for how much? Where would the public find more information?
• What are the values that are guiding allocations? How and when will the public be engaged with this process?
As always there will be time for comments and questions. We hope you will plan on attending and please share the information with your friends, family, neighbors, and members of your community and civic organizations.