The City of Valparaiso will soon be asking the public for input on how to spend $7.6 million of federal COVID money. Mayor Matt Murphy told the city council Monday that he wants to use some of the American Rescue Plan funds to compensate city employees — like police, firefighters, and first responders — who provided essential services during the pandemic. The rest would be focused toward youth and seniors.
"I want to see investments that are benefiting Valparaiso both now and well into the future," Murphy said.
Valparaiso has put an online portal on its website to let residents share ideas.
But some think the city needs to go further. Council Member Robert Cotton suggested following the guidelines given by the Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs, to bring all the stakeholders to the table.
"I think we're doing a disservice to the spirit and the content of what's in the plan, and I would suggest that everybody read it because, you know, it's pretty clearly something that's bottoms-up as opposed to top-down," he told the rest of the council.
But resident Jessica Jepsen argues that Cotton hasn't reached out to the groups he says should be included. "What has happened in the last two years during COVID is more people are coming to the [domestic violence] shelter than ever before, and that's just by looking at the past four years of data, pre-COVID. Deaths from 2020 to 2021, [domestic violence] deaths, went up 181 percent," Jepsen said.
Meanwhile, resident Walt Breitinger feels young people have strong opinions, especially on environmental issues, but are often unaware of the American Rescue Plan. "I know you mentioned to have everybody involved, but it may take a little bit of an extra effort to make sure that people under 25 years old are aware of what's going on and invited to participate to express their goals," he said.
Valparaiso's ARP allocation was announced last March, but Mayor Murphy said he wanted to wait until the program's rules were finalized before developing a plan. That also gives city officials a chance to see what's worked and what hasn't in other communities. Porter County has drawn backlash for proposing to use some of its ARP money to upgrade the Memorial Opera House.
