‘Splitting our costs.’ Not on list for federal virus aid, KC must coordinate with counties
Kansas City will likely have to coordinate with the governments of four different counties to get its share of federal coronavirus aid as the U.S. Treasury Department appears to have rebuffed pleas from city leaders for direct assistance.
Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas has repeatedly argued that the city should be eligible for direct aid based on projections by city planners that place the city’s 2020 population at roughly 505,000. The federal stimulus package passed by Congress set 500,000 as the threshold for a city or county to qualify for direct aid.
But Kansas City’s name was absent when the Treasury Department posted a list of eligible local governments to its website Monday.
The Treasury Department used 2019 projections from the U.S. Census Bureau, which places the city a few thousand under the threshold. Other large cities that miss the cut include Miami, Raleigh, St. Louis and Atlanta.
In a phone call Tuesday, Lucas said Kansas City would continue to make its case to the Treasury Department and submit its expected expenses ahead of the April 17 deadline.
Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Missouri, had sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin asking for him to use the city’s internal numbers to allow it to receive direct aid, but the request was rebuffed.
“It’s not in my style to demonize the administration during a crisis, but, as the representative of Missouri’s 5th congressional district, I am officially irked,” Cleaver said in a statement Monday evening. “The decision to withhold critical funding from our larger urban areas during a global pandemic just because we don’t do a Census every year is dangerous and irresponsible.”
Cleaver said he would seek to lower the population threshold in the next relief bill. The 500,000 cutoff was created with the boroughs of New York City in mind, according to Capitol Hill sources.
Missouri is set to receive a total of $2.38 billion later this month to cover costs faced by state and local governments during the COVID-19 pandemic. The bulk will be controlled by the state, but two communities meet the threshold for direct federal aid, according to the Treasury Department’s list.
Jackson County will receive a portion of that aid directly based on its population of more than 700,000 as will St. Louis County with its population of nearly 1 million. The specific total for each county has not yet been released but it will be based on population. Jackson County officially applied for the aid Monday.
Lucas said that Kansas City faces unique challenges as a city that spans four counties, a point he’s made to Missouri Gov. Mike Parson.
“Not only are we Missouri’s largest city, but we are also the only city that sits in four counties,” Lucas said.
The supplemental budget passed last week by Missouri lawmakers and signed by Parson authorizes the state to steer roughly $1.07 billion of the federal dollars it receives — about 45 percent of the stimulus money — to local governments. The legislation says that at least 25 percent of the money will be distributed to local governments within 10 days of the state receiving it.
A provision on the final page of the legislation says that the federal aid will be distributed to the counties, which Lucas’ office interprets as meaning it’ll have to go through each county for its share of the aid.
“The situation as it’s set up right now is that Kansas City will have to make sure we’re working with leadership in Cass, Clay, Platte and Jackson Counties,” Lucas said.
“One challenge that you might think of is how do we even go about splitting our costs,” Lucas said, pointing to city homeless shelters and public safety agencies that serve people in all four counties.
Lucas said that he will continue to talk Parson to ensure efficient distribution of the aid to Kansas City and “make sure in collaboration with all of the counties that Kansas City sits that we’re spending money to support our public safety workers.”
No cities in Kansas qualify for direct aid, but both Johnson County with more than 600,000 and Sedgwick County with nearly 520,000 are both on the list. Kansas will receive $1.25 billion in aid, the minimum amount for states.
Caleb Clifford, chief of staff for Jackson County Executive Frank White, said Jackson County will be coordinating closely with Kansas City as it spends the money it receives directly from the federal government.
“We’ve worked with Mayor Lucas’ office. We’ve had multiple discussions with them to make sure that we’re doing everything we can to get the maximum impact for our communities from those dollars,” he said.
Missouri Treasurer Scott Fitzpatrick is leading a task force that will oversee the distribution of the federal aid.
Fitzpatrick’s spokeswoman, Mary Compton, said one of the first topics the task force would review is how local governments should apply for aid, including those that fall partly within counties receiving direct federal aid, such as Kansas City.
Clifford said the county is still waiting for more guidance from the Treasury Department about spending parameters, but he said its focus is shoring up its health care safety net with support for Truman Medical Center and providers.
He said the expected federal aid will help pay for the $8 million in spending the county has already approved, but he also said that more state and federal support will be needed for both the county and the cities within it.
“People can see a large number and assume there’s going to be money there for every need,” Clifford said.
“We do not believe these funds will be sufficient to fight coronavirus in Jackson County.”
This story was originally published April 14, 2020 at 3:42 PM.
