You may or may not remember the Festivus episode of Seinfield, depending on your age. After all, we aren’t just four old ladies! If you’re not familiar with it, you can read more about it here: Festivus. There are lots of Christmas stories, but let’s indulge in a Festivus story, and this one is about the recent early childhood ARPA funding. You may remember that the county executive recently vetoed $2.5 million in ARPA funding for child care. Erie County Council voted to override this veto with a 5-2 supermajority.
We’ll start with the airing of the grievances. The funds are to be administered by ECGRA (Erie County Gaming Revenue Authority) with ECGRA contributing matching funds. There are a couple of key points to note about the contract between ECGRA and the county, because the county executive apparently has some grievances. One, the county information officer must be notified when a grant is to be awarded. Note that ECGRA already makes it a practice that the county executive is notified. Maybe because the county executive is out of the office so much, he might not getting the messages. Two, there are now to be two checks issued for each grant…one from ECGRA and one from the county, so that taxpayers know that the county is involved. The checks that have previously been issued have both ECGRA and the county’s name on them. Does he really need his own check to hold? Is he trying to take credit for these grants? These are the same funds he VETOED! And, at least when there is one check, there is another entity checking the math. We’ve seen the relationship between the administration and math, and…yeah.
This contract was still being negotiated last week, with the deadline for appropriation of ARPA funds of December 31st rapidly approaching, and he’s quibbling about large checks for photo-ops?! That might be an indication of his priorities.
And now to feats of strength. This was won by Erie County Council and ECGRA. Thank you to Erie County Council for overriding the county executive’s veto by a 5-2 margin (with Bayle and Schauerman voting against). Thank you to ECGRA for being the adults in the room when this contract was negotiated. Both entities showed that the taxpayers and families are their priority, and showed great strength in their leadership.
And a final airing of the grievances for the taxpayers. Both when the $1.5 million in ARPA funding was granted to Gannon and when the lease in Blasco Library was announced, the county executive claimed how good Project NepTWNE would be for the future of our children. Yet, he vetoed $2.5 million in ARPA funds for those children for early child care. Let that sink in. Then he essentially hard-wires terms in a contract for those $2.5 million to get more photo-ops in a year where he is up for re-election. Let that sink in as well. Happy Festivus!
For more details: Brenton Davis contractually requires ECGRA to tout county’s involvement when awarding childcare grants
“It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.”
~Harry S Truman
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