Tag Archives: American Rescue Plan

Biden Administration, Housing

FACT SHEET: In Nevada, President Biden Doubles Down on Plan to Lower Housing Costs and Increase Housing Supply for American Families

President Biden is working to lower housing costs and increase the housing supply to address the large shortage of affordable homes inherited from his predecessor. In his State of the Union address, he called on Congress to support the construction and rehabilitation of two million additional homes, lower costs for renters, and help first time homebuyers and families seeking to trade up or downsize. © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

President Biden is working to lower housing costs and increase the housing supply to address the shortage of affordable homes. This fact sheet is provided by the White House:

President Biden is working to lower housing costs and increase the housing supply to address the large shortage of affordable homes inherited from his predecessor. In President Biden’s State of the Union address, he called on Congress to support the construction and rehabilitation of two million additional homes, lower costs for renters, and help first time homebuyers and families seeking to trade up or downsize.
 

During a visit to Las Vegas, Nevada, President Biden detailed his agenda to bring down the cost of housing and described the investments the Biden-Harris Administration has already made through the American Rescue Plan (ARP). The ARP provided $1 billion in Nevada to help boost affordable housing, lower housing costs, and keep homeowners and renters in their homes. This includes $700 million invested in affordable housing supply that includes major investments in senior housing. As a result, Clark County has several major 200-unit affordable housing developments coming, and about 1,000 new senior apartments on the way thanks to the ARP.
 
The President’s Fiscal Year 2025 Budget includes a historic $258 billion in housing investments to give working families a fair shot, including an historic expansion in rental assistance for low-income families, while reducing the deficit by asking corporations and the wealthy to pay their fair share. These new proposals build on his Housing Supply Action Plan, major investments provided by the ARP, and actions the Biden-Harris Administration has already taken to increase the housing supply and lower housing costs for American families, including reducing mortgage insurance premiums by $800 per year for hundreds of thousands of homeowners, expanding rental assistance to more than 100,000 additional households, and building tens of thousands of affordable housing units. These actions have contributed to a record high of nearly 1.7 million homes currently under construction nationwide.
 
President Biden’s Plan to Lower Housing Costs and Build Two Million Homes
 
Reduce Barriers to Homeownership
For many Americans, owning a home is the cornerstone of raising a family, building wealth, and joining the middle class. Too many working families feel locked out of homeownership and are unable to compete with investors for a limited supply of affordable for-sale homes. President Biden is calling on Congress to enact legislation to enable more Americans to purchase a home, including:

  • Mortgage Relief Credit. President Biden is calling on Congress to pass a mortgage relief credit that would provide middle-class first-time homebuyers with a tax credit of $10,000 over two years. This is the equivalent of reducing the mortgage rate by more than 1.5 percentage points for two years on the median home, saving families $400 per month on their mortgage payments. It will help more than 3.5 million middle-class families purchase their first home over the next two years. The President’s plan also calls for a new credit to unlock inventory of affordable starter homes, while helping middle-class families move up the housing ladder and empty nesters right size. The President is calling on Congress to provide a one-year tax credit of up to $10,000 to middle-class families who sell their starter home, defined as homes below the area median home price in the county, to another owner-occupant. This proposal is estimated to help nearly 3 million families.
  • Down Payment Assistance for First-Generation Homeowners. The President continues to call on Congress to provide up to $25,000 in down payment assistance to first-generation homebuyers whose families haven’t benefited from the generational wealth building associated with homeownership. This proposal would help about 400,000 families purchase their first home.
  • Lowering Closing Costs. The Federal Housing Finance Agency has approved policies and pilots to reduce closing costs for homeowners, including a pilot to waive the requirement for lender’s title insurance on certain refinances. This would save thousands of homeowners up to $1500, and an average of $750, and the lower upfront fees will unlock substantial savings for homeowners as mortgage rates continue to fall and more homeowners are able to refinance. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau will also pursue rulemaking and guidance to address anticompetitive closing costs imposed by lenders on homebuyers and homeowners.  These charges—which benefit the lender but not the borrower—can add thousands to the upfront costs of a mortgage. 
  • Promoting Competition in the Housing Market. In his State of the Union Address, the President discussed the importance of boosting competition and lowering housing costs, and the Department of Justice has made those goals a priority. Last week’s settlement reached by the National Association of Realtors is an important step toward boosting competition in the housing market. It could save as much as $10,000 on the median home sale. Now, the Administration is calling on realtors and lenders to offer more choices and lower costs, while promoting access to homeownership for first-time, low-income, and low-wealth homebuyers.

Lowering Costs by Building and Preserving 2 Million Homes
America needs to build more housing in order to lower rental costs and increase access to homeownership. That’s why the President is calling on Congress to pass legislation to build and renovate more than 2 million homes, which would close the housing supply gap and lower housing costs for renters and homeowners.

  • Tax Credits to Build More Housing. President Biden is calling for an expansion of the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit to build or preserve 1.2 million more affordable rental units. Renters living in these properties save hundreds of dollars each month on their rent compared with renters with similar incomes who rent in the unsubsidized market. The President is also calling for a new Neighborhood Homes Tax Credit, the first tax provision to build or renovate affordable homes for homeownership, which would lead to the construction or preservation of over 400,000 starter homes in communities throughout the country.
  • Innovation Fund for Housing Expansion. The President is unveiling a new $20 billion competitive grant fund as part of his proposed Budget to support communities across the country to build more housing and lower rents and homebuying costs. This fund would support the construction of affordable multifamily rental units; incentivize local actions to remove unnecessary barriers to housing development; pilot innovative models to increase the production of affordable and workforce rental housing; and spur the construction of new starter homes for middle-class families. According to independent analysis, this will create hundreds of thousands of units which will help lower rents and housing costs.
  • Increasing Banks’ Contributions Towards Building Affordable Housing. The President is proposing that each Federal Home Loan Bank double its annual contribution to the Affordable Housing Program – from 10 percent of prior year net income to 20 percent – which will raise an additional $3.79 billion for affordable housing over the next decade and assist nearly 380,000 households. These funds would support the financing, acquisition, construction, and rehabilitation of affordable rental and for-sale homes, as well as help low- and moderate-income homeowners to purchase or rehabilitate homes.
  • Bolstering Efforts to Prevent and End Homelessness. The President is calling for $8 billion for a new grant program to rapidly expand temporary and permanent housing strategies for people experiencing or at risk of homelessness. Funds from this proposal would support non-congregate emergency shelter solutions, interim housing, rapid rehousing, permanent supportive housing, and rental housing for extremely low-income households experiencing housing instability or homelessness. 

Lowering Costs for Renters
President Biden is also taking actions to lower costs and promote housing stability for renters. The White House Blueprint for a Renters Bill of Rights lays out the key principles of a fair rental market and has already catalyzed new federal actions to make those principles a reality. Today, President Biden is announcing new steps to crack down on unfair practices that are driving up rental costs:

  • Fighting Rent Gouging by Corporate Landlords. The Biden-Harris Administration is taking action to combat egregious rent increases and other unfair practices that are driving up rents. Corporate landlords and private equity firms across the country have been accused of illegal information sharing, price fixing, and inflating rents. As part of the President’s Strike Force on Unfair and Illegal Pricing, he is calling on federal agencies to root out and stop illegal corporate behavior that hikes prices on American families through anti-competitive, unfair, deceptive, or fraudulent business practices. In a recent filing, the Department of Justice (DOJ) made clear its position that inflated rents caused by algorithmic use of sensitive nonpublic pricing and supply information violate antitrust laws. Earlier this month, the Federal Trade Commission and DOJ filed a joint brief further arguing that it is illegal for landlords and property managers to collude on pricing to inflate rents – including when using algorithms to do so.
  • Cracking Down on Rental Junk Fees. Millions of families incur burdensome costs in the rental application process and throughout the duration of their lease, from “convenience fees” simply to pay rent online to fees charged to sort mail or collect trash. These fees are often more than the actual cost of providing the service, or are added onto rents to cover services that renters assume are included—or that they don’t even want. Last fall, the FTC proposed a rule that if finalized as proposed would ban misleading and hidden fees across the economy, including in housing rental agreements. HUD has released a summary of banned non-rent fees within their rental assistance programs. These actions build on voluntary commitments the President announced last summer from major rental housing platforms to provide customers with the total, upfront cost on rental properties on their platform.
  • Expanding Housing Choice Vouchers. Over the last three years, the Administration has secured rental assistance for more than 100,000 additional households. The President is calling on Congress to further expand rental assistance to more than half of a million households, including by providing a voucher guarantee for low-income veterans and youth aging out of foster care – the first such voucher guarantees in history. Receiving a voucher would save these households hundreds of dollars in rent each month.

The ARP Provides $1 Billion to Boost Housing Supply and Provide Housing Help in Nevada:

  • Nevada is a national leader in investing ARP funding in affordable housing: In Nevada, the ARP has provided over $1 billion for housing investments, including helping to fund the construction of thousands of new units in Clark County, making them one of the national leaders in using this money to expand supply of affordable housing.
  • Investing in Down-Payment Assistance to help Nevadans buy homes: The state also used ARP funds to provide 500 Nevadans with $15,000 in down-payment assistance to purchase a home. 
  • Nevada State and local governments have used $700 million through the ARP to support major affordable housing projects.
  • About 1,000 ARP-supported Senior Affordable Apartments on the way in Clark County today, including, for example:
    • 195 Units of affordable housing at Pebble and Eastern Senior Apartments in Clark County currently under construction.
    • 125 Units of affordable housing at Nevada HAND’s Buffalo and Cactus Senior Apartments in Clark County currently under construction.

The ARP Has Invested Billions of Dollars to Support Affordable Housing:

  • Through the State and Local Fiscal Recovery Fund, over 940 state and local governments have invested more than $18 billion for housing assistance, homelessness, and affordable housing initiatives, including over $6 billion to build and preserve housing.
  • State and local governments are using an additional $5 billion in funding through the ARP’s HOME Investment Partnerships Program to build or rehabilitate at least 20,000 units of affordable housing and support an additional 23,000 households with rental assistance, non-congregate shelter, or supportive services. 

New data released today shows that since the ARP’s passage, states, Tribal governments, and territories have distributed $6.6 billion HAF award funds to over 500,000 homeowners for past due mortgage payments, utility expenses, and property taxes, as well as other housing related expenses. As a result of this program and the strong economic recovery, foreclosure starts are well below pre-pandemic levels.

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FACT SHEET: The American Rescue Plan (ARP): Top Highlights from 3 Years of Recovery

  1. Led to the Strongest Jobs Recovery on Record and the Strongest Recovery in the World: When President Biden came into office, there was tremendous economic uncertainty. Unemployment was at 6.4% when President Biden took office. Unemployment was not projected to drop below 4% until the end of 2025 in CBO’s February 2021 (Pre-ARP) Forecast. Instead, unemployment was below 4% for the past 25 months in a row – the strongest record in more than five decades. 
    1. ARP drove historic 3-year job growth with 15 million jobs added since President Biden took office.
    1. Not only recovered all the lost jobs but added an additional 5.5 million more jobs versus pre-Covid.
    1. Powered the strongest recovery in the world: After the American Rescue Plan passed, the U.S. saw by far the fastest recovery in the G7, with significantly higher real wage growth. US has lower apples to apples core inflation than all major European allies.
    1. Powered the Most Equitable Recovery in Memory: In past recessions, persistent high long-term and youth unemployment as well as high numbers foreclosures and evictions led to long-term harms – “scarring” for millions of Americans and hard, long roads back for Black and Latino Americans. President Biden’s Rescue Plan ensured that didn’t happen this time:
    1. Historic drops in unemployment for Black and Latino workers: With the strong recovery powered by ARP, Black unemployment saw its largest 1-year drop since the early 1980s and reached its lowest-ever annual rate in 2023; Hispanic unemployment saw its fastest 1-year drop and reached its lowest 2-year rate ever in 2022 & 2023.  
    1. Least scarring in any recovery in memory: The American Rescue Plan led to the fastest drop in long-term and youth unemployment ever. It kept foreclosures historically low and evictions 20% below historic avgs.
    1. Led to dramatic reduction in inequality: Economists have found that the strong post-ARP labor market’s wage increases for middle-income and lower-income workers erased nearly 40% of the rise in wage inequality increases from the previous four decades.
    1. Lowest women’s annual unemployment rate since 1953: This recovery has seen a dramatic decline in women’s unemployment to an average of 3.5% in 2023, the lowest annual average since 1953.
    1. Strong recovery for Asian American, Pacific Islander, and Native Hawaiian communities: Asian American unemployment averaged 2.9% over the last two years and AA NHPI small business formation surged. Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander unemployment also fell by half from a 9% avg. in 2020 to 4% in 2022-2023.
    1. Led to the Largest Federal Investments in Preventing Crime, Reducing Violence, and Investing in Public Safety in History. Since the passage of the American Rescue Plan, we’ve had the largest federal investment in advancing public safety and preventing violence in our history through ARP funding and other federal funding.
    1. Over $15 billion in ARP funds committed to preventing crime and reducing violence, with investments by over 1,000 state and local governments to avoid cuts to police budgets, hire more police officers for safe, effective, and accountable community policing, ensure first responders have the equipment they need to do their jobs, and expand evidence-based community violence intervention and prevention programs.
    1. That includes $1.2 billion for Medicaid Mobile Crisis Intervention Services – the American Rescue Plan included $1.2 billion to fund mobile crisis intervention units staffed with mental health professionals & trained peers. 
    1. It also includes $1 billion in Family Violence Prevention and Services Program to reduce domestic violence with immediate crisis intervention, health supports, and safety.
    1. American Rescue Plan’s Expansion of the Affordable Care Act Led to Record-Breaking Health Care Enrollment and Savings: ARP substantially increased consumer subsidies, eligibility to middle-income families and provided strong incentives for states to expand Medicaid through the Affordable Care Act. Result:
    1. ARP/IRA-extended ACA extension led to over 21 million Americans enrolling in coverage, an increase of 9 million from when POTUS took office.
    1. Thanks to the American Rescue Plan and Inflation Reduction Act, millions of Americans are saving an average of $800 a year on premiums. The Biden-Harris Administration is committed to keeping health insurance premiums low, giving families more breathing room and the peace of mind that health insurance brings. To do that, the President is calling on Congress to make the expanded premium tax credits that the Inflation Reduction Act extended permanent.
    1. Provided health coverage to 3 million Americans who would have otherwise had no health insurance.
    1. Provided affordable health coverage to millions of middle-class Americans who were previously excluded from receiving consumer subsidies.
    1. Provided more than $3 billion in Medicaid funding to North Carolina, Missouri, Oklahoma, and South Dakota for Medicaid expansion, covering over one million people.
    1. Gave states an easier pathway to extend Medicaid postpartum coverage for a full 12 months – ensuring access to critical care for nearly 700,000 women in 45 states and the District of Columbia.
    1. Largest Small Business Boom in History Due to ARP-Driven Strong Recovery and Small Business Investments: The Biden-Harris Administration:
    1. Increased COVID EIDL to $2 million while increasing anti-fraud controls.
    1. Reformed PPP to more equitably distribute funds to the smallest businesses.
    1. Restaurant Revitalization Fund helped over 100,000 restaurants, bars, and food trucks stay open.
    1. Shuttered Venues Program provided relief to 13,000 venues.
    1. Invested a historic $10 Billion in the State Small Business Credit Initiative leveraging up to $100 billion in capital for small businesses.
    1. Invested in innovative Community Navigators program that delivered training to over 350,000 entrepreneurs and 1:1 counseling services to over 33,000 small business owners
    1. Invested $125 million through the Capital Readiness Program to 43 non-profit community-based organizations to help underserved entrepreneurs launch and scale their small businesses – winners ranged from Asian/Pacific Islander Chamber of Commerce to Urban League of Greater Atlanta.
      This, and the strong recovery that ARP powered, led to:
    1. A record 16 million new business applications over the past 3 years; 55% higher than year before pandemic.
    1. Share of Black households owning a business has more than doubled, and Latino and Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander small business formation surged as well.  
    1. Women-owned businesses formation substantially outpaced overall business formation.
    1. Led to Lowest Child Poverty Rate in American History: The American Rescue Plan expanded the Child Tax Credit, made it fully refundable, and delivered it monthly in 2021. This historic expansion drove:
    1. Child poverty cut nearly in half to lowest rate ever.
    1. Black child poverty cut by over 50%, Hispanic child poverty cut by 43%, and dramatic drops in Native American, white and Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander child poverty—all record lows.
    1. Over 9 million children in rural areas benefited from the expanded credit.
    1. 5 million children in Veteran and active-duty families benefited from the expanded credit.
    1. Child Tax Credit payments were delivered reliably with the first ever monthly payment – on the 15th of each month with 90% using direct deposit.
    1. Over 60 million children in 40 million working families received largest Child Tax Credit in history.
    1. Historic expansion to ~240,000 Puerto Rican families: For the first time, ARP permanently made Puerto Rican families eligible for the same Child Tax Credit as other American families. ARP also quadrupled funding available for Puerto Rico’s Earned Income Tax Credit.
    1. Funded a Historic Vaccination Campaign: ARP provided $160 billion to support vaccination, therapeutics, testing and mitigation, PPE, and the broader COVID Response effort. This led to:
    1. Over 230 million Americans are fully vaccinated, up from 3.5 million when President Biden took office, while closing the racial gap in vaccine access.
    1. First-Ever National Eviction Policy Called “The most important eviction prevention policy in American history.” 
    1. Emergency Rental Assistance and other American Rescue Plan assistance helped over 8 million hard-pressed renters stay in their homes without sacrificing other basic needs.  
    1. Emergency Rental Assistance and Other ARP housing policies cut eviction filings to 20% below historic averages since start of Biden-Harris Administration.
    1. Called the “the most important eviction prevention policy in American history” by Matthew Desmond, Pulitzer Prize Winner author of “Evicted” – and the “deepest investment the federal government has made in low-income renters since the nation launched its public housing system.”
    1. HUD Emergency Housing Vouchers have already helped 47,500 households at risk of homelessness lease their own rental housing – supporting those at risk of or experiencing homelessness or housing instability, and those fleeing domestic violence.
    1. Helped Keep Over 225,000 Child Care Programs Open and Provided Historic Nationwide Support for Medicaid Home-Based Care
    1. American Rescue Plan Stabilization Assistance has reached over 225,000 Child Care Providers – that employ 1 million child care workers – and have the capacity to serve as many as 10 million children.
    1. Led to lower child care costs by $1,250 per child, helped bring hundreds of thousands of women with young children into the workforce, and increased wages for child care workers by 10%, according to Council of Economic Advisors Report.
    1. More than 8-in-10 licensed child care centers nationwide received ARP assistance.
    1. Benefited 30,000 rural child care programs – in most states, 97% of rural counties or more received aid.
    1. Invested $37 billion to expand access to home-based care and support direct care workers: Thanks to the American Rescue Plan, President Biden delivered $37 billion that all 50 states and the District of Columbia chose to invest to expand access to home care and improve the quality of caregiving jobs.
    1. Investing in ALL of America:
    1. For First Time in History, Direct Relief to Every Town, City, County, Tribe and State – No Matter How Big or Small, Urban or Rural – So they Could Design their Own Recovery:
    1. Before ARP, 70% of cities forecasted layoffs or major cuts in services and half of states were freezing or cutting jobs. Today, cities and states have funds to invest in major challenges – like public safety, housing, workforce, and rehiring, instead of making dramatic cuts.
    1. ARP provided direct fiscal relief to every state & territory and 30,000 cities and towns – while previous plans reached only 154 local governments or fewer. This has led to:
    1. Immediately reversed planned layoffs in cities and states across the country – and helped drive a recovery of 1.3 million state and local jobs, recovering all of the state and local jobs lost in roughly one-third the time it took to recover state and local jobs after the Great Recession.
    1. Major investments in critical areas:
      1. $25 billion to jumpstart universal broadband access – including Broadband Connections for 18 million students through the Emergency Connectivity Fund so that schools and libraries could close the homework gap.
      1. $12.8 billion in State & Local Funds invested in over 4,300 workforce investments by state and local governments.
      1. Over $20 billion in State & Local Funds invested in water infrastructure.
      1. $18.5 billion in State & Local Funds invested in housing – expanding supply, investing in homeless services, and providing 3.7 million additional households rent, mortgage, and utility relief.
         
    1. Largest Ever Investment in Tribal Communities
    1. ARP provided largest one-time investment in Tribal communities in history – providing more than $32 billion specifically allocated for Tribal communities and Native people, including $20 billion in Fiscal Recovery Funds that were quickly and directly distributed to Tribal governments in 2021 to stabilize Tribal economies devastated by the pandemic.
    1. Invested in first-ever Tribal Small Business Credit Initiative Awards.
    1. Focus on Tribal Communities in Place-Based grants including $45 million Build Back Better Regional Challenge (BBB-RC) grant to the Mountain Plains Regional Native CDFI Coalition to grow the Native finance sector and expand economic opportunity.
       
    1. Investing in Rural America: Innovative rural-focused investments include:
    1. ARP provided direct fiscal recovery funding to every single rural government so that they could avoid painful layoffs and design their own recovery. Past recovery bills only sent direct fiscal relief to largest cities.
    1. ARP Child Care Stabilization Reached 30,000 rural child care programs – in most states, 97% of rural counties or more received aid.
    1. USDA invested $1 billion to expand independent meat and poultry processing capacity to give farmers more market options and fairer prices, and reduce reliance on a handful of meat and poultry corporations.
    1. Rural unemployment rates in 2023 were at their lowest point (3.6 percent) since before 1990.
    1. Full rural jobs recovery: Rural employment has returned fully to pre-COVID levels.
    1. Major Investment in Workforce Training and Connecting Americans to Good Jobs:
    1. Tens of billions from the American Rescue Plan have gone to workforce training efforts, including $12.8 billion in State and Local Funds invested in over 4,300 workforce investments across the country, including pre-apprenticeships and other programs to prepare for new infrastructure, health care & care jobs.
    1. $500 million in competitive Good Jobs Challenge Awards for 32 Workforce High-Quality Training Partnerships across the country.
    1. $1 billion Competitive Build Back Better Regional Challenge – 21 Winners won between $25 million and $65 million to execute transformational projects and revitalize local industries. Projects include developing workforce training programs, connecting workers to jobs, and other transformational investments.
    1. Historic investment in expanding and supporting our health care workforce, including:
       
    1. $1.1 billion investment in the community health workforce, including in mental health workforce.
    1. Rapid deployment of 14,000+ community outreach workers (in 150+ national & local organizations). For example, the Association of Asian/Pacific Community Health Organizations used American Rescue Plan funds to establish the CHW Workforce Collaborative (the Collaborative). The Collaborative has since hired, trained, and deployed more than 250 CHWs who speak over 36 Asian, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander languages in 12 continental U.S. states and Hawaii.
    1. Establishment of the first-of-its-kind public health AmeriCorps to build and train the next generation of public health leaders, already serving 82 organizations across the country and supporting more than 3,000 AmeriCorps members.
    1. Supporting the largest field in history (over 22,700 providers) for the National Health Service Corps, Nurse Corps, and Substance Use Disorder Treatment and Recovery programs, treating more than 23.6 million patients in underserved communities.
    1. Provided recovery funding for more than 15,000 School Districts to Safely Reopen K-12 Schools, Support Academic Recovery, and Invest in Student Mental Health:
    1. ARP provided critical relief to more than 15,000 school districts to reopen safely, support academic recovery, and invest in student mental health.
    1. Data from school district plans show that schools are using these funds well, focusing on efforts to support academic recovery:
      1. Nearly 60% of funds are committed to investments like staffing, tutoring, afterschool and summer learning programs, new instructional resources and materials, and mental and physical health supports.
      1. Another 23% is going to keep schools operating safely, including providing PPE and updating school facilities. This includes investments in lead abatement and nearly $10 billion for HVAC.
      1. Nearly half of school districts invested in summer learning programs which proven to boost math scores.

     This has led to:

  • Going from 46% of schools that had safely opened to full-time in-person teaching to 100%: In January 2021, CDC data showed that just 46% of schools were open full-time in-person. Today, all schools are open.
    • Led to a major increase in staffing and investments to address student mental health: Schools now employ 31% more school social workers and 31% more school nurses than pre-pandemic. School districts have added more than 600,000 local education jobs since January 2021 and recovered to pre-pandemic levels.
    • Eighteen Million College Students Have Received Direct Financial Assistance from the Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund that was expanded by ARP:
    • Colleges reached an estimated 18 million students with direct financial assistance from the Higher Education Emergency Relief (HEERF) fund since the beginning of 2021.
    • Direct financial assistance for an estimated 6 million community college students.
    • 80% of Pell Grant recipients received direct financial relief in 2021.
    • An estimated 450,000 students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) received direct financial assistance. In 2021, 77% of HBCUs used HEERF funds to discharge unpaid student balances.
    • Historic Investment in Pension Security for up to 3 million Union workers & retirees: ARP’s Special Financial Assistance is the most significant investment in pension security for union workers and retirees in the past 50 years.
    • Over 200 multiemployer plans that were on pace to become insolvent in the near term will now have solvency and able to pay full benefits until at least 2051.
    • Preventing a wave of multi-employer insolvencies for 2-3 million workers who would have seen major cuts to their earned retirement benefits.
    • Pension cuts reversed for over 80,000 workers and retirees in 18 “MPRA” multiemployer plans
    • Most significant effort to protect the solvency of the multiemployer pension system in almost 50 years.
    • First-Ever Summer Nutrition Benefit for Students w/ Nationwide Reach – Extended Permanently:
    • ARP created the first-ever summer nutrition benefit with nationwide reach, helping children who rely on free and reduced-price school meals afford food over the summer.
    • 30 million young people: Reached the families of 30 million students.

Permanent: Congress extended this innovative program permanently in 2022’s Omnibus bill, the first major new permanent food assistance program in nearly five decades

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From the White House: The American Rescue Plan: Top 15 Highlights from 2 Years of Recovery

The American Rescue Plan funded a Historic Vaccination Campaign: ARP provided $160 billion to support vaccination, therapeutics, testing and mitigation, PPE, and the broader COVID Response effort. © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

This fact sheet from the White House outlines the top 15 highlights from two years of recovery under the American Rescue Plan:

  1. Led to the Strongest Jobs Recovery on Record: When President Biden came into office, there was tremendous economic uncertainty. Unemployment was at 6.1% when the American Rescue Plan (ARP) passed. It was expected to average 5% in 2022. With the passage of ARP, unemployment averaged 3.6% in 2022 and fell to 3.4% at the beginning of 2023.
  • ARP Drove the Strongest 2-year job growth ever: Over 12 million jobs have been added since President Biden took office – the largest 2-year total in US history and more jobs in two years than in any previous administration’s full year term.
  • Powered the Fastest Recovery in the World: After the American Rescue Plan passed, the US recovered significantly faster than our G7 Peers – with 5.9% growth in 2021 – while our inflation is in the middle of the pack and slower than other countries that did significantly less to help their economies recover.
     
  1. Powered the Most Equitable Recovery in Memory: In past recessions, persistent high long-term and youth unemployment as well as high foreclosures of evictions led to long term harms – “scarring” for millions of Americans and hard, long roads back for Black and Hispanic Americans.

President Biden’s Rescue Plan ensured that didn’t happen this time:

  • Historic drops in Black and Hispanic Unemployment: With the strong recovery powered by ARP, Black unemployment saw its largest 1-year drop since 1984 and is near record lows; Hispanic unemployment saw its fastest 1-year drop and reached its lowest annual rate ever in 2022. Asian American unemployment fell significantly as well – falling by more than half from its January 2021 rate. 
  • Least scarring in any recovery in memory: The American Rescue Plan led to the fastest drop in long-term and youth unemployment ever, which both now stand at pre-pandemic levels. It kept foreclosures historically low and evictions 20% below historic averages even after the end of the CDC Eviction Moratorium.
     
  1. Lowered Health Care Premiums by $800 for over 13 Million Americans: ARP lowered health care premiums – which were extended by the Inflation Reduction Act, increased eligibility to middle- income families and provided strong incentives for states to expand Medicaid through the Affordable Care Act. Result:
  • Saved over 13 million Americans an average of $800 a year on their health premiums.
  • Led to most Americans in history having health insurance
  • Provided health coverage to 3 million Americans who would have otherwise had no health insurance.
  • Provided an extra $1.5 billion in Medicaid funding to Missouri, Oklahoma, and South Dakota for Medicaid expansion coverage to over half a million people.
  • Gave states an easier pathway to extend Medicaid postpartum coverage for a full 12 months – ensuring access to critical care for over 438,000 women nationwide.
     
  1. Largest Small Business Formation Boom in History Due ARP-Driven Strong Recovery and Small Business Investments: The Biden Administration:
  • Increased COVID Emergency Injury Disaster Loans to $2 million, while increasing anti-fraud controls
  • Reformed PPP to more equitably distribute funds to the smallest businesses.
  • Restaurant Revitalization Fund helped over 100,000 Restaurants, Bars, and Food Trucks stay open.
  • Shuttered Venues Program provided relief to 13,000 venues.
  • Invested a historic $10 Billion in the State Small Business Credit Initiative

This, and the strong recovery that ARP powered, led to:

  • A record 10.5 million new small business applications over the past 2 years
  • Hispanic entrepreneurs started small businesses at the highest rate in more than a decade in 2021 and 23 percent faster than pre-pandemic levels. 
  • Black-owned small businesses were created at the fastest rate in 26 years, as the Washington Post found.
  • Asian American entrepreneurs started small businesses at the fastest rate in over a decade in 2021.
     
  1. Led to Lowest Child Poverty Rate in American History: The American Rescue Plan and its expanded monthly Child Tax Credit led to:
  • Child Poverty nearly cut in half to lowest rate – 5.2% – ever.
  • Black child poverty cut by 52%, Hispanic child poverty cut by 43%, Native American child poverty cut by 51%, and dramatic drops in white and Asian child poverty — all to record lows.
  • ~9 million children in rural areas benefited from the expanded credit.
  • 5 million children in Veteran and Active-Duty families benefited from the expanded credit
  • Child Tax Credit payments were delivered reliably with the first ever monthly payment – on the 15th of each month with 90% using direct deposit.
  • Over 65 million children in 40 million working families received largest Child Tax Credit in history.
  • Historic Child Tax Credit Expansion already reached over 230,000 Puerto Rico families: Recent data shows that over 230,000 Puerto Rico households will get the expanded Child Tax Credit. 8X the number from the previous year.
     
  1. Funded a Historic Vaccination Campaign: ARP provided $160 billion to support vaccination, therapeutics, testing and mitigation, PPE, and the broader COVID Response effort.

This led to:

  • Over 230 million Americans are fully vaccinated, up from 3.5 million when President Biden took office.
     
  1. Helped Over 8 Million People Stay in Their Homes:
  • Emergency Rental Assistance – the first national eviction prevention policy in history – was main American Rescue Plan source of multi-month assistance to help over 8 million hard-pressed renters stay in their homes without sacrificing other basic needs.  
  • Emergency Rental Assistance and Other ARP Housing Policies led Eviction Filings to remarkably stay 20% below historic averages in 1.5 years after end of the eviction moratorium.
  • Called the “the most important eviction prevention policy in American history” by Matthew Desmond, Pulitzer Prize Winner author of “Evicted” – and the “deepest investment the federal government has made in low-income renters since the nation launched its public housing system.”
  • HUD Emergency Housing Vouchers have already helped 47,500 households at risk of homelessness lease their own rental housing – these American Rescue Plan funded vouchers support those at risk of or experiencing homelessness or housing instability, and those fleeing domestic violence.
     
  1. Helped Keep 200,000 Child Care Centers Open
  • American Rescue Plan Stabilization Assistance has reached 200,000 Child Care Providers – that employ 1 million child care workers – and have the capacity to serve more than 9 million children.
  • 90% of programs reported that American Rescue Plan funds helped them stay open.
  • More than 8 in 10 licensed child care centers nationwide have received ARP assistance.
  • Benefited 30,000 rural child care programs – in most states, 97+% of rural counties received aid.
     
  1. For First Time in History, Direct Relief to Every Town, City, County and State – No Matter How Big or Small, Urban or Rural So they Could Design their Own Recovery:
  • Before ARP, 70% of cities anticipated layoffs or major cuts in services and half of states were freezing or cutting jobs. Today, cities and states have funds to invest in major challenges – like public safety, housing, workforce, and rehiring, instead of making dramatic cuts.
  • ARP provided direct fiscal relief to every state & territory and 30,000 cities and towns – while previous plans reached only 154 local governments, or fewer, with direct flexible relief.

 
This has led to:

  • American Rescue Plan Led to Surge in State Revenue Growth – Powering Economic Resilience: Before ARP, state revenues were expected to grow just 3.7% in 2021, after falling in 2020. After ARP, state revenues grew by 16.6% in 2021 (record high growth) – and over 14% growth in 2022. As a result, state surpluses are powering resilience economy-wide.
  • Major investments in critical areas:
    • Over $25 billion to Jumpstart Universal Broadband Access – including Broadband Connections for 16 million students through the Emergency Connectivity Fund for schools and libraries to close the homework gap.
    • Over $10 billion from ARP’s State & Local Fund invested in over 3,000 workforce projects
    • Over $20 billion in State & Local funds invested in water infrastructure
    • Over $14 billion in State & Local Funds invested in housing – expanding supply, investing in homeless services, and providing 3.7 million additional households rent, mortgage, and utility relief.
       
  1. One of the Largest Federal Investments in Preventing Crime, Reducing Violence, and Investing in Public Safety in History.
  • Over $10 billion committed to preventing crime and reducing violence, with investments by hundreds of state and local governments to avoid cuts to police budgets, hire more police officers for safe, effective, and accountable community policing, ensure first responders have the equipment they need to do their jobs, and expand evidence-based community violence intervention and prevention programs.
    • Toledo, Ohio used this funding to train a second cohort of new police recruits for the first time and plans for 100 new officers in the next few years; Mercer County invested in a county-wide radio system and improved its 911 system; Baltimore invested $50 million for its comprehensive violence prevention strategy, including community violence intervention programs.
  • That includes $1.2 billion Medicaid Mobile Crisis Intervention Services – the American Rescue Plan included $1.2 billion to fund mobile crisis intervention units staffed with mental health professionals & trained peers. 
  • It also includes $1 billion Family Violence Prevention and Services Program to reduce domestic violence with immediate crisis intervention, health supports, and safety.
     
  1. Funding School Districts Across the Nation to Reopen K-12 Schools, Support Academic Recovery, and Invest in Student Mental Health:
  • ARP provided critical relief to 16,000 school districts and other local education agencies to reopen safely, support academic recovery, and invest in student mental health.
  • Data from School District Plans show that schools are using these funds well:
    • Nearly 60% of funds are committed to investments like staffing, tutoring, after-school and summer learning, new textbooks and learning materials, and mental and physical health supports.
    • Another 23% is going to keep schools operating safely, including providing PPE and updating school facilities. This includes investments in lead abatement and nearly $10 billion for HVAC.

This has led to:

  • Going from 46% of schools that had safely opened to full-time in-person teaching to 100%: In January 2021, CDC data showed that just 46% of schools were open full-time in-person. Today, all schools are open.
  • A major increase in staffing and investments to address student mental health: Schools now employ 36% more school social workers, 11% more school counselors, and 28% more school nurses than pre-pandemic.
     
  1. Major Investment in Workforce Training and Connecting Americans to Good Jobs:
  • Over $40 billion from the American Rescue Plan has gone to workforce training efforts, including over $10 billion from ARP’s State and Local Fund invested in over 3,000 workforce projects across the country, including pre-apprenticeships and other programs to prepare for new infrastructure, health care and care jobs.
  • $500 million Competitive Good Jobs Challenge Awards for 32 Workforce Training Partnerships across the country
  • $1 billion Competitive Build Back Better Regional Challenge – 21 Winners won between $25 million and $65 million to execute transformational projects and revitalize local industries. Projects include developing workforce training programs and connecting workers to jobs – and other transformational investments.
  • Historic Investment in Expanding and Supporting our Health Care Workforce, including:
  • $1.1 Billion investment in the Community Health Workforce, including increasing the mental health workforce
  • Well over $10 Billion of American Rescue Plan Home and Community Based Services (HCBS) funds being used for workforce efforts.
  • Rapid deployment of over 14,000 community outreach workers (through over 150 national and local organizations).
  • Establishment of the first-of-its-kind Public Health AmeriCorps to build and train the next generation of public health leaders, already serving 82 organizations across the country and supporting more than 3,000 AmeriCorps members.
  • Supporting the largest field strength in history (over 22,700 providers) for the National Health Service Corps, Nurse Corps, and Substance Use Disorder Treatment and Recovery programs, treating more than 23.6 million patients in underserved communities
     
  1. Eighteen Million College Students Have Received Direct Financial Assistance from the Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund that was expanded by ARP:
  • Colleges have reached an estimated 18 million students with direct financial aid from Higher Education Emergency Relief (HEERF) since the beginning of 2021 to help them stay in school and help cover basic needs during the pandemic, like food, housing, and child care.
  • Direct financial assistance for an estimated 6 million community college students.
  • 80% of Pell Grant recipients received direct financial relief in 2021.
  • An estimated 450,000 students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) received direct financial aid. Further, in 2021, 77 percent of HBCUs used HEERF funds to discharge unpaid student balances.
  • Nine in 10 institutions reported that HEERF funds enabled them to keep students enrolled who were at risk of dropping out due to pandemic-related factors.
     
  1. Historic Investment in the Pension Security for up to 3 million Union workers & retirees: ARP’s Special Financial Assistance is the most significant investment in pension security for union workers and retirees in the past 50 years.
  • Over 200 multiemployer plans that were on pace to become insolvent in the near term will now have solvency ensured until at least 2051 solvent & paying full benefits thanks to ARP.
  • Preventing a wave of multi-employer insolvencies for 2-3 million workers who would have seen major cuts to their earned retirement benefits.
  • Pension Cuts Reversed for over 80,000 Workers and Retirees in 18 “MPRA” Multiemployer Plans that had taken cuts to avoid insolvency.
  • Most significant effort to protect the solvency of the multiemployer pension system in almost 50 years.
     
  1. First-Ever Summer Nutrition Benefit for Students with Nationwide Reach– Extended Permanently:
  • ARP created the first-ever summer nutrition benefit with nationwide reach.
  • 30 million young people: Reached the families of 30 million students.
  • Permanent: Congress extended this innovative program permanently in last year’s Omnibus bill, the first major new permanent food assistance program in nearly five decades.
Biden Administration, Economic Development, Economic Policies, Economy, News & Photo Features

White House Memo: Five Key Points on our Economic Transition and How We Got Here

Even before disruptions to global energy and food markets from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine drove inflation higher, many other factors boosted demand, shifted its composition, and constrained supply, which led to higher prices. Higher gas prices – which have become a political weapon – are also caused by price gouging as Big Oil reaps record profits. And consumers, spoiled by low gas prices from the last two years, are finding ways to reduce consumption, which would benefit the climate © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

This memo, highlighting five key points of America’s transition to sustainable growth, the role the American Rescue Plan played in that growth, and how the Administration is turning its focus to address a range of global economic challenges with inflation chief among them, was provided by the White House:

Earlier this week, the President noted that our economy is in a moment of transition: from what has been an historic economic recovery to what can be a period of stable, steady growth that works for working families. The President understands that Americans are dealing with the challenge of elevated inflation. And addressing inflation is his top economic priority.

This is a moment when we can build on the unique strengths of our recovery to bring down inflation and ensure that we don’t give up the historic economic gains of the last year. It also means building on the recovery to deliver growth that actually works for working families – unlike the growth that we saw too often in the years before the pandemic, when we were promised that gains for those at the top would trickle down to working families. President Biden’s approach is to build the economy from the bottom up and the middle out.

As we look ahead and aim to achieve stable, steady growth, here are five key points about how we arrived at our current economic moment. In short, the Administration passed the American Rescue Plan in a moment of significant economic uncertainty and, because of the Administration’s decisive action, we now face a range of global economic challenges – with inflation chief among them – from a position of strength. 

  1. The American Rescue Plan helped deliver one of the strongest job markets in American history.

When President Biden took office, the unemployment rate was 6.4% and around 20 million Americans were on unemployment insurance. Since then, the unemployment rate has come down to 3.6 % — with only three times in the last 50 years when the rate has been lower – and fewer than 1.5 million Americans are receiving unemployment insurance. Before the Rescue Plan passed, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected the unemployment rate would be 5% right now, and would not drop below 4% until 2026. In addition, the number of Americans between the ages of 25 and 54 who are working or looking for work is higher today than it was before the pandemic began. In the wake of the Great Recession, that recovery took 12 years. As the Washington Post noted this weekend, we are in the midst of a “great return to work.” While it “took more than six years to recover from the Great Recession … this jobs recovery is on track to take about 2.5 years. That’s worth celebrating.”

  1. The American Rescue Plan has meant the U.S. recovery has been the envy of the world.

According to the latest World Economic Outlook from the International Monetary Fund, the U.S. economy will be larger at the end of this year—relative to its pre-pandemic size—than any other Group of 7 economy. The U.S. economy may grow faster this year than China’s economy for the first time since 1976, according to a projection by Bloomberg Economics. CBO recently projected that U.S. economic growth would continue in 2022 and 2023, albeit at a slower rate than in 2021, with unemployment remaining low and inflation falling throughout this year and next. The CBO forecast was roughly in line with the consensus of private sector forecasters.

  1. The American Rescue Plan has meant economic security for millions of families.

Since President Biden took office, incomes are up 5.1% overall and by 11.9% for the bottom 50% of the income distribution – even after accounting for inflation – due to job creation and higher earnings. Self-reported financial well-being at the end of 2021 reached its highest level on record, with 78% of adults reporting that they are financially comfortable. In the same survey, 68% of Americans said they could cover a $400 emergency cash expenses – the highest level in the history of the survey and up 18 percentage points since 2013. Bankruptcy filings also remained below pre-pandemic levels, eviction filings have remained 30% below pre-pandemic levels across the eight months since the eviction moratorium ended, and foreclosures hit an all-time low in 2021.

  1. The Rescue Plan didn’t just improve our economic position; it improved our fiscal position too.

The CBO projected that the deficit will fall by $1.7 trillion this year. This is the largest nominal reduction in the federal deficit in history. According to their projections, the deficit as a share of the economy this year will be at a lower level than in 2019, before the pandemic. It is also a lower level than CBO projected for this year before the American Rescue Plan passed, showing that the strong economic recovery resulting from President Biden’s economic and vaccination plans were not just good for our economy but also for our fiscal position. Public debt as a percent of the economy is also projected to be lower this year than was projected before the Rescue Plan passed – further reflecting the degree to which our strong economic recovery has improved our fiscal position. This progress on deficits and debt was not pre-ordained. In addition to responsibly winding down emergency programs, around half of the reduction in the deficit this year is projected to be driven by an increase in revenues, as household and business earnings have increased given the strong economic recovery.

  1. Inflation is a global challenge, with many causes, but the Rescue Plan is not its predominant cause.

Inflation is elevated around the world, particularly in light of Putin’s invasion into Ukraine, which has driven global food and energy prices higher. Inflation is at its highest level on record in the Euro Area and in Germany, the highest level in 40 years in the U.K., and the highest level in more than 30 years in Canada. Consumer prices have risen by 8.2% in the United States in the last year, 8.1% in the Euro Area, and 9% in the United Kingdom.

Putin’s actions in Ukraine have driven inflation higher in recent months, with gas prices up $1.51 since Putin began amassing troops on the border of Ukraine. It is of course not plausible that disruptions in global energy and food markets are the result of the American Rescue Plan.

And even before disruptions to global energy and food markets have driven inflation higher, many other factors boosted demand, shifted its composition, and constrained supply, which led to higher prices. The pandemic meant that American consumers shifted their consumption from services to durable goods. Businesses were unprepared for demand returning quickly, and we saw an inward shift in supply capacity – from auto production to domestic energy production to rental cars. And supply chain pressures meant bottlenecks and thinner inventories that also drove up prices.

That’s why we know that even without the Rescue Plan – or with a smaller Rescue Plan – inflation would have still been elevated. In fact, according to one independent analysis, keeping inflation close to 2% would have required an unemployment rate in the double digits – instead of today’s 3.6% unemployment rate. Moreover, without the Rescue Plan, another independent analysis shows that we would have had less growth, less job creation, and more human suffering.

Biden Administration, Coronavirus Pandemic, Economy, Education, Health Care, News & Photo Features, President Joe Biden

On 1-Year Anniversary of American Rescue Plan, Highlighting the Difference in People’s Lives

ARP powered historic jobs recovery – with the largest calendar increase in jobs on record, unemployment down to 3.8%, and record drops in Hispanic Unemployment and Youth Unemployment – and ensured less scarring than any recovery in memory.

Among the ways the American Rescue Plan, signed a year ago, had a positive impact on people’s lives is funding the distribution of 200 million vaccines and millions of therapeutics, saving lives and spurring the biggest, fastest rebound in the economy in the world © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

With the focus on Ukraine’s desperate fight against Russia’s criminal war and President Joe Biden’s role in marshaling the free world in its defense, little attention is being paid to the Biden Administration’s domestic actions that are having real achievements. On the one-year anniversary of the American Rescue Plan, the White House highlighted the difference the ARP is making in ordinary people’s lives; – Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

Lowering Health Care Costs and Increasing Health Coverage

  • 14.5 million Americans – the most ever – signed up for ACA marketplace plans due to, on average, 50% lower costs in premiums for returning consumers.
    • Nationwide, existing consumers with a new or updated plan selection after ARP saved an average of $67 (or 50%) per consumer per month on premiums, totaling $537 million per month in savings. In twenty states and the District of Columbia, existing consumers saved over $75 per month, on average, due to the ARP.
       
  • 5.8 million more Americans have health insurance today than a year ago. Between 2016 and 2019, 3.6 million Americans lost coverage.
     
  • A family of four is saving an average of $2,400 on their annual premiums. Four out of five consumers could find quality coverage for under $10 a month.
     

Investing in Mental Health:

  • $3 billion invested in expanding access to mental health and substance use services at the state level – largest one-time investment in history for mental health and substance use programs.
     
  • Billions more in American Rescue Plan funding are being used to address mental health challenges affecting our children, including through hiring school social workers and counselors. With the help of American Rescue Plan K-12 funding, schools have already seen a 65% increase in social workers, and a 17% increase in counselors. 

 
Fighting COVID

  • Distributed 200 million vaccines, and millions of therapeutics using ARP dollars.
     
  • 375 million at-home tests per month now available; before ARP, no at-home tests.
     
  • $14.5 billion to address COVID for America’s veterans, including support for 37,000 homeless veterans.

 
Getting Kids Back in School

  • Today, 99% of schools are open. Before ARP, only 46% of schools were open in-person.
     
  • Major Investments in Keeping Schools Open, Combatting Learning Loss & Addressing Mental Health Challenges: Independent experts estimate based on school district plans that 59% of school districts are using ARP funds to hire/retain teachers and counselors, 35% are using ARP funds to hire/retain psychologists and mental health staff, and 52% are using ARP funds for HVAC and ventilation.
     
  • A survey from the School Superintendents Association indicated 82% of superintendents plan to use funds to expand social, emotional, mental and physical health and development.

 
Supporting Working Families

  • Expanded Child Tax Credit for Working Families – Helping Deliver Record Lows in Child Poverty.
    • The 2021 CTC will reach a record nearly 40 million families with 65 million children.
    • Expanded $3,000 credit for kids age 6-17 and $3,600 for kids under 6
    • Experts estimate that the Child Tax Credit was the main driver in the American Rescue Plan bringing child poverty to record lows in 2021– including record low Black and Hispanic child poverty.
       
  • Economic Impact Payments for Vast Majority of Americans
    • Over 170 million Economic Impact Payments to 85% of all Americans – including an additional 19+ million payments to Social Security beneficiaries, 3 million payments to SSI beneficiaries, and 320,000 payments to Veterans who would not have received these benefits under normal tax filing requirements.
       
  • Ensured Kids didn’t go hungry in the summer
    • Estimated 30 million kids fed with first nationwide Summer supplemental nutrition program – more than 10x higher than 2019 summer meals for kids.
       
  • Unprecedented Emergency Rental Relief and Eviction Prevention
    • Over 4 million Emergency Rental Assistance payments to tenants in a single year – by orders of magnitude the largest eviction prevention effort in history.
    • Eviction filings at just 60% of historic averages in 5 months after CDC moratorium – even though some had projected an eviction tsunami.
       
  • More than doubled the amount of LIHEAP – the most ever going to help with Heating and Cooling Costs of well over 5 million households

 
Helping People Get Back to Work

  • Most One-Time Support for Childcare Providers Ever to Keep Them Open and Operating
    • 150,000+ providers supported by childcare stabilization payments so far, the most support for childcare providers ever.
    • More than 5 million children served by these providers.
       
  • Expanded Earned Income Tax Credit for Workers
    • Tripled EITC for 17 million workers without dependent children from $540 to $1500 – first increase since 1993 – and extended the credit to younger & older workers.
    • Helping millions of front-line workers: This expansion will help nearly 1.8 million cashiers and retail salespeople; almost 1 million cooks and food prep workers; and more than 850,000 nurses and health aides, 500,000 janitors, 400,000 truck and delivery drivers, and 300,000 childcare workers.
       
  • Getting Americans Back to Work with State and Local Investments
    • Over half of states and scores of cities across the country have invested in workforce development, apprenticeships, training, and premium pay for essential workers – with premium pay to nearly 750,000 essential workers.
    • State and local governments added 467,000 jobs in 2021 – best year since 2001.

Staying True to Our Veterans:

  • ARP provided resources for veterans currently receiving housing support, including an estimated 37,000 homeless veterans.
     
  • ARP cancelled health care copayment charges for 2.5 million veterans during the pandemic – worth $1 billion.
     
  • ARP Child Tax Credit expansion meant that roughly 5 million children in veteran and Active Duty families are receiving the credit for 2021, per CBPP estimates.
     
  • ARP invested in 16,000 veterans’ health care with ARP funds for 158 State Veterans Homes operations and for State Veterans Home renovations and capital projects.
  • ARP funding is enabling the Veterans Benefits Administration to reduce the claims backlog from 212,000 in March 2021 to 100,000 by September 2022.  

 
Rescuing and Transforming Our Communities:

  • Dozens of cities and 21 states have already committed ARP Fiscal Recovery Funds to public safety, including critical investments in gun crime prevention – hiring and retaining police officers for community policing and investing in critical technology to take on increases in gun and other violent crimes, and supporting evidence-based community violence interventions and summer youth employment.
     
  • State and local, Education and HUD investments in affordable housing and fighting homelessness:
    • ARP Department of Education program to provide services and enable full attendance for students experiencing homelessness will reach 1.5 million children. 
    • ARP added about 70,000 emergency vouchers to the rental market through HUD.
    • ARP funded new housing counseling program which is expected to provide 80,000 housing counseling sessions.
    • Roughly half of cities and states are investing some portion of their State and Local Funds in housing assistance and investments – from New Jersey’s $750 million eviction prevention and utilities program to Austin and Travis County’s $200 million ARP investment in a comprehensive plan to take on its homelessness crisis.
       
  • Broadband Investments underway across the country: 20 states have already invested Fiscal Recovery Funds to expand broadband access – in addition to $10 billion Capital Projects Fund which they can use to help ensure that all communities have access to high quality modern infrastructure needed to access critical services, including broadband.
    • Even with more on the way, states and territories have already announced about $9 billion in ARP investments to expand high speed internet access.
       
  • Long-needed investments in clean water: with 21 states already committing Fiscal Recovery Funds to improve water and sewer infrastructure, including removing lead pipes.
    • Even with more on the way, states and territories have already announced investing $7.5 billion in ARP funds for water and sewer improvements.

Providing Permanent Tax Relief for Puerto Rico Families

  • Made hundreds of thousands of families in Puerto Rico eligible for CTC for first time – previously ~90% of families excluded from CTC.
     
  • First-ever Federal Support for Puerto Rico’s EITC, more than tripling workers’ benefits.

Most support ever for Tribal Communities

  • $32 billion to Tribal communities and Native people, the largest in assistance to tribal governments in history.

FACT SHEET:
How The American Rescue Plan Is Keeping America’s Schools Open Safely, Combating Learning Loss, And Addressing Student Mental Health
 

On March 11, 2021 – one year ago – President Biden signed the American Rescue Plan (ARP) Act into law, an unprecedented $1.9 trillion package of emergency assistance measures. The ARP provides a historic investment in America’s preschool through twelfth grade (P-12) schools in response to the COVID-19 pandemic to keep schools safely open, tackle learning loss and mental health. These funds include $122 billion for P-12 schools in Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ARP ESSER) funds. ARP also dedicated an additional $8 billion to states and school districts to meet the needs of certain student populations, including over $3 billion for students with disabilities and $800 million for children and youth experiencing homelessness.
 
ARP has already had a significant impact on schools across the country: over the last year, states, school districts, and schools have used these funds to safely reopen and sustain in-person instruction, combat learning loss, and address students’ mental health needs.
 
In his State of the Union address last week, President Biden called on schools to hire more teachers, urged the American people to sign up to be tutors and mentors, and – as part of his unity agenda – encouraged the country to come together to address child mental health. ARP ESSER funds are supporting this agenda in several ways:

  • Schools have gone from 46% open before ARP to 99% safe and open today: Before ARP was signed into law, just 46 percent of America’s P-12 schools were open for full-time, in-person learning. Today, over 99 percent of P-12 schools are open for full-time, in-person instruction.
     
  • ARP led to record growth in local education jobs that are critical to meeting students’ academic and mental health needs: Although there is more work to do to address longstanding educator shortages and return to pre-pandemic levels, ARP has led to record jobs growth in the education sector. With the help of ARP ESSER funding, local governments added more than 279,000 education jobs in 2021 – the best calendar year of jobs growth since records began in 1956 – and added an additional nearly 46,000 jobs in the first two months of 2022. Schools have already seen a 65% increase in social workers and a 17% increase in counselors relative to before the pandemic.
     
  • Analysis of school district plans shows overwhelming majority of funds are being used for priorities like teachers, counselors, academic recovery, mental health, and health and safety measures like ventilation improvements:  FutureEd – an education think tank at Georgetown University’s McCourt School of Public Policy – analyzed data on a representative sample of over 3,000 school districts’ plans covering 55% of ARP ESSER funds. This analysis showed:
    • Nearly 60% of funds are being used to:
      • invest in staffing – both retaining current staff and expanding professional development opportunities, as well as recruiting, hiring and training of new teachers, school staff and mental health professionals to increase school capacity and meet the academic and mental health needs of students;
      • combat learning loss through student support programs such as evidence-based tutoring, expanded after-school and summer learning and enrichment programs, and the purchase of millions of new textbooks and learning materials; and 
      • supporting the physical and mental health of students and educators.
    • Another 24% is being invested in keeping schools operating safely, including providing PPE and updating school facilities to support health and safety. This includes investments in lead abatement and an estimated nearly $10 billion for improvements to HVAC and ventilation.
       
  • ARP has fueled investments in education spending and accelerated the rate of spending of education relief funds by five to six times: Before the passage of ARP, states and school districts were spending a total of a little more than $500 million per month of federal emergency relief funds for education. Since the passage of the ARP and the assurance to states and school districts that critical funds were on their way, the monthly rate of spending of ESSER funds from ARP and earlier relief legislation has accelerated to more than $3 billion per month – an increase of five to six times.
     
  • All 50 states submitted clear spending plans that have been approved by the U.S. Department of Education: On March 24, less than two weeks after ARP was signed, two-thirds of funds – $81 billion – were released. To ensure funds would be used effectively, states had to submit and receive approval on their spending plan to receive their final third of funds. As of December 2021, every state, plus DC and Puerto Rico, submitted a plan, the U.S. Department of Education has approved all plans, and all $122 billion in ARP ESSER funds have been made available to states.
     
  • Survey of 600 school superintendents shows school leaders are meeting the challenge of the President’s unity agenda by using funds for students’ mental health and other developmental needs: The COVID-19 pandemic has subjected many young Americans to social isolation, loss of routines, and traumatic grief – increasing the need for mental health supports. A recent survey by AASA, The School Superintendents Association, found that 82% of districts plan to use funds to address this need by expanding supports for social, emotional, mental, and physical health and development.
     
  • States and school districts have deployed funds strategically while engaging meaningfully with their communities – including parents: In developing their spending plans, states and school districts were required to engage members of the community, including parents, educators, students, representatives of students with disabilities and others. The U.S. Department of Education continues to encourage states and school districts to consult with these critical partners on how to ensure these funds have the most impact in classrooms.

ARP ESSER-Funded State and District Activities
From the U.S. Department of Education
 
Safely Reopening Schools and Sustaining Safe Operations
Safely reopening schools and keeping them open safely are essential for student learning and well-being. 

  • Houston Independent School District (HISD) in Texas has allocated ARP ESSER funds to campuses for COVID-19 mitigation efforts. HISD has provided COVID-19 testing at 90 percent of its campuses and has hosted nearly 100 vaccine clinics.
     
  • The DeKalb County School District in Georgia upgraded air filters from MERV 8 to MERV 13 in every school facility that could accommodate that size filter and took steps to improve ventilation in all other schools using ARP ESSER funding.
     
  • White Plains City School District in New York will use a combination of local and federal funds to replace the HVAC units across their district to provide a safer learning environment for students and staff. Upon completion, the total project will cost $26.3 million, with nearly one-third of the funding coming from relief funds, including ARP ESSER.

Combating Learning Loss
States and school districts have the resources they need, and are required to address the impacts of the pandemic on students’ learning. States and districts nationwide are using funds to hire teachers and other instructional staff, launch tutoring, summer and afterschool programs (which states are required to fund), and make long-overdue investments in instructional materials. States are specifically required to address the needs of students disproportionately impacted by the pandemic, including students with disabilities, English learners, and students experiencing homelessness.
 
Recruiting, Retaining, and Expanding Professional Development of Staff:

  • Maine School Administrative District 11 is addressing gaps in learning opportunities by using ARP ESSER funds to hire nine new teachers and implement a new math, language arts, and social studies program. The additional teachers permitted the district to reduce class sizes from 22-24 students to an average of 14-16 students. The district has provided external and internal coaching, ongoing professional learning, and additional support to educators and staff.
     
  • Gaston County Schools in North Carolina is adding an additional teacher and a temporary employee per school to decrease class sizes, help manage workloads and provide classroom coverage in each of its 54 schools using ARP ESSER funding. This supports and helps retain current teachers, who are less likely to have to give up planning time to cover another classroom, or combine classrooms, and also benefits students whose learning is less likely to be disrupted by the absence of another teacher.
     
  • The Asheville City Schools Board of Education in North Carolina is using ARP ESSER funds for a bonus of $3,000 to $3,500 over the course of the year for full-time teachers and faculty in order to increase staff retention.
     
  • Providence Public School District in Rhode Island is launching new incentives to recruit and retain highly-qualified educators, including early signing bonuses for newly-hired educators and support staff in hard-to-fill positions using  ARP ESSER funding.

Summer Learning and Enrichment:  

  • In New Mexico, the College and Career Readiness Bureau of the New Mexico Public Education Department launched the Summer Enrichment Internship Program in 2021 using ARP ESSER funding. The program covers the cost of summer internships for New Mexico high school students and provides high school students, particularly those most impacted by the pandemic, with the opportunity to participate in high-quality internships in government agencies, including county, tribal, and municipal placements. Over 300 community partners and 1,200 student interns participated across 26 counties. Summer jobs programs like these that engage students are also important community violence intervention strategies. This program will continue in the summer of 2022 as well.
     
  • Cleveland Metropolitan School District in Ohio used ARP ESSER funds to increase summer learning participation seven-fold. In 2021, 8,400 students participated in summer school, compared to 1,000-1,200 students in previous years. Focused on “Finish, Enrich, and Engage,” the expanded summer school offered 12 weeks of programming that allowed for credit accumulation and unfinished learning. Students engaged in problem-based learning units in the morning with engagement activities like clubs and sports in the afternoon. This inclusive programming, which included students with disabilities and multilingual learners, will continue in summer 2022.
     
  • The Oklahoma State Department of Education is using ARP ESSER funds to implement evidence-based summer learning and enrichment programs and to expand afterschool programming through partnerships with community organizations. They provide for social, emotional, and academic support and access to technology. This initial investment of $6 million provided services through 28 organizations, at 140 sites, serving an average 11,000 students a month through the summer of 2021.

Tutoring: 

  • The Arkansas Division of Elementary and Secondary Education has established the Arkansas Tutoring Corps using ARP ESSER funding. The Arkansas Tutoring Corps program includes recruitment, preparation, and support for candidates to become qualified tutors to provide instruction or intervention to meet the academic needs of students most impacted by lost instructional time. A system connects prepared candidates with organizations seeking to support students’ academic needs. The program is already enhancing learning experiences of students due to loss of instructional time and addressing gaps in foundational skills in mathematics and literacy.

 
Meeting Students’ Social, Emotional, and Mental Health Needs
Districts and states must use a portion of ARP ESSER funds for evidence-based interventions that respond to students’ social, and emotional needs – such as the ability to collaborate with others or persist through difficult challenges – and to support students’ mental health. Districts must specifically address the impact of the pandemic on groups of students that were disproportionately impacted. 
 
Hiring Counselors and Increasing Supports:

  • The Kansas Department of Education has developed a Grow Your Own Counselor model with ARP ESSER funding that encourages districts to identify candidates and employ them as student services coordinators while they develop their skills in an approved school counseling graduate program.
     
  • The Nevada Department of Education has allocated $7.5 million to support districts in hiring 100 additional school based mental health professionals. Using ARP ESSER funding, the state is spending $1.7 million to hire a Multi-Tiered Systems of Support coach for every district.
     
  • Plymouth-Canton Community Schools in Michigan hired three full-time high school counseling staff to decrease counselor caseloads with ARP ESSER funding. Counselors are now able to dedicate more time to individual student meetings, attend meetings with assistant principals and deans to review academic progress and other needs of students, and develop a wellness center at each campus.

Community Schools:

  • The New York City Department of Education announced an investment of $10 million to expand the district’s research-based community schools initiative from 266 to 406 sites citywide using ARP ESSER funding. These schools provide integrated student support services to students and the surrounding community, such as mental health care, adult education courses, community violence intervention programs, and nutrition support.

Strengthening the Educator Workforce
The pandemic has taken a toll on the nation’s educators as well as its students. States and districts should support and stabilize the educator workforce and make staffing decisions that will help address students’ social, emotional, mental health, and academic needs. 

  • The Tennessee Department of Education has created a “Grow Your Own” grant with federal funding, including ARP ESSER, that is designed to foster partnerships between educator preparation programs (EPPs) and districts to provide promising and innovative, no-cost pathways to the teaching profession by increasing EPP enrollment and growing the supply of qualified teachers. The program is currently comprised of 65 partnerships between 14 EPPs and 63 districts across the state – enabling over 650 future educators to become a Tennessee teacher for free. $6.5 million has been allocated to this program thus far. Tennessee also pioneered a pathway with the U.S. Department of Labor by establishing the nation’s first registered apprenticeship program for teachers, which will help sustain the state’s Grow Your Own programs and partnerships leveraging federal apprenticeship funding.  
Biden Administration, Energy, Housing, Infrastructure, News & Photo Features

White House Announces Additional Actions to Help Families Afford Energy Bills, Building on Historic Investments

On National Energy Assistance Day, White House Coordinates Outreach and Encourages Families to Enroll in Assistance Programs

The White House is joining states, localities, advocacy groups, and utilities in encouraging American families to apply for programs that can help hard-pressed families address home energy costs. Households in need of help with their energy bills can identify resources in their area at EnergyHelp.us or call the National Energy Assistance Referral hotline at 1-866-674-6327. © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

The White House is joining states, localities, advocacy groups, and utilities in encouraging American families to apply for programs that can help hard-pressed families address home energy costs. These resources include the record funding for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) provided by the Biden-Harris Administration this year and funds to reduce home energy costs in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. In addition to outreach efforts across the Administration, the White House also announced information encouraging states to use all available American Rescue Plan resources for energy assistance and funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to reduce home energy costs.

  • Funds from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law Are Building on the American Rescue Plan’s Investment That More Than Doubled LIHEAP Funding: The Biden-Harris Administration has delivered nearly $8 billion in LIHEAP funding nationally, more than doubling typical annual appropriations—thanks to an additional $4.5 billion provided by President Biden’s American Rescue Plan. Earlier this month, the White House announced state-by-state breakdown of this funding (see below for total awards to date by state/territory). Last week, the Administration also distributed the first $100 million installment of a five-year, $500 million investment in LIHEAP provided by President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. These funds represent the largest investment in a single year since the program was established in 1981. These resources are already allowing states across the country to provide more home energy relief to low income Americans than ever before.
  • The American Rescue Plan Provided Additional Historic Resources for Utility Relief Including the Emergency Rental Assistance (ERA) Program and State & Local Fiscal Recovery Fund: The American Rescue Plan provided other critical resources that states and localities can use to address home energy costs. ERA programs, which received an additional $21.5 billion in funding from the American Rescue Plan, can provide help with past-due utility bills or ongoing assistance with energy costs to help distressed renters avoid shut-offs and keep current on expenses. State & Local Fiscal Recovery Funds can also be deployed to help deliver energy relief to families.
  • The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law Made Historic Investments to Reduce Home Energy Costs: The President’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law invested a historic $3.5 billion in the Department of Energy’s Weatherization Assistance Program, reducing energy costs for hundreds of thousands of low-income households by increasing the energy efficiency of their homes.

 The Administration is announcing the following:

  • Outreach in Support of National Energy Assistance Day: Today, the Department of Health and Human Services released a radio announcement in English and Spanish and a video to encourage families to apply for LIHEAP. The radio announcement will air over 2,000 times and reach an estimated 36 million listeners. Yesterday, the Department also released a Dear Colleague Letter to LIHEAP Administrators encouraging their participation in National Energy Assistance Day. Other agencies across the Administration are also celebrating National Energy Awareness Day by disseminating information about assistance programs, including LIHEAP and ERA. The White House also coordinated outreach to state and local elected officials as well as other stakeholders.
  • Information on Using the Pandemic Emergency Assistance Fund for Utility Assistance: The American Rescue Plan created a $1 billion fund for states, territories and tribes that is available to provide cash or targeted assistance to needy families. Today, the Department of Health and Human Services released a brief on how to use these funds to respond to winter utility needs.
  • Significant Support Distributed Through American Rescue Plan Housing Programs: As of the end of 2021, well over $25 billion of funds have been obligated to assist households across the country through the ERA program, which provides both rental and utility assistance to households in need. Treasury continues to promote best practices such as avoiding shut-offs for eligible households and allowing self-attestation to document substantial increases in home heating or other utility costs to support eligibility. Treasury is also working with states and Tribes to distribute $9.8 billion in funding for the Homeowners Assistance Fund, with a majority of approved plans including utility assistance to homeowners in need.
  • Best Practices on Coordination with Utility Providers: Yesterday, the Department of Health and Human Services and the Treasury Department hosted a webinar with over 700 utility assistance program administrators and utility providers from across the country to discuss how programs including LIHEAP and ERA can coordinate with utility providers to increase the efficiency and reach of their programs. Panelists from across the country shared their perspectives on effective coordination between utility assistance administrators and utility providers and highlighted a range of best practices.

 Today’s announcements build on the Administration’s previous actions to ensure these historic resources are distributed swiftly and equitably:

  • Encouraged States to Plan Early: In November, the White House called on states, localities, and tribes to plan early to distribute American Rescue Plan funds to address home energy costs this winter.
  • Secured Commitments from Utilities to Avoid Shut-offs and Expedite Aid: The White House has called on utility companies to prevent devastating utility shut-offs and help expedite the delivery of unprecedented federal aid. In January, the White House announced that it has already welcomed commitments from fourteen major utility companies across the country, including Atlantic City Electric, Baltimore Gas and Electric, ComEd, Delmarva Power, DTE Energy, Eversource, Green Mountain Power, National Grid, NorthWestern Energy, Pacific Gas & Electric, PECO, Pepco, Portland General Electric and Vermont Gas, as well as the delivered fuel trade association NEFI.
  • Called for Coordination of LIHEAP and Emergency Rental Assistance Relief to Families: To maximize the impact of home energy assistance, the White House called for states, localities, and tribes to coordinate across programs including LIHEAP and ERA. The Department of Health and Human Services and the Treasury Department have issued guidance and co-hosted webinars on LIHEAP and ERA best practices that attracted 500 administrators – collectively representing 47 states, the District of Columbia, and 72 Tribal governments. More than 50 percent of these administrators now report they are coordinating across these programs.

Households in need of help with their energy bills can identify resources in their area at EnergyHelp.us or call the National Energy Assistance Referral hotline at 1-866-674-6327.

Biden Administration, Housing

Biden Administration Takes Action to Protect Americans from Rising Home Heating Costs

The Biden-Harris Administration called on states, localities and tribes to plan early and coordinate across programs to effectively use historic American Rescue Plan resources to address home energy costs this winter. The White House also called on utility companies that receive public dollars to prevent devastating utility shut-offs this winter and help expedite the delivery of unprecedented federal aid © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

The Biden Administration, recognizing the pressure American families are under because of rapidly rising costs for food, gasoline and home heating oil, largely caused by the sudden surge in demand at a time when supply chains are still struggling under the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, has taken a number of steps to alleviate pressure. The administration has worked to alleviate the bottlenecks at major ports, facilitated hiring of truck drivers, and has relieved much of the pressure (Los Angeles port has 29 percent fewer containers waiting to be dispatched); Biden has directed the FTC to insure gas and oil companies are not gouging consumers, and now, the Biden Administration announced it would deploy American Rescue Plan funds to protect American families from home heating costs. Here is a fact sheet of the Administration’s actions on home heating costs – Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

FACT SHEET:

Biden Administration Deploys American Rescue Plan Funds to Protect Americans from Rising Home Heating Costs; Calls on Utility Companies to Prevent Shut Offs This Winter

 Unprecedented Funding and Partnerships with State, Local and Tribal Governments to Protect Vulnerable Homeowners and Renters

Today, the Biden-Harris Administration called on states, localities and tribes to plan early and coordinate across programs to effectively use historic American Rescue Plan resources to address home energy costs this winter. The White House also called on utility companies that receive public dollars to prevent devastating utility shut-offs this winter and help expedite the delivery of unprecedented federal aid.
 
The American Rescue Plan provides critical resources that states, localities and tribes can use to address home energy costs:

  • More than doubling available Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) funding: The recent average annual funding for LIHEAP is $3-4 billion, which typically serves 5 million households. The American Rescue Plan provided an additional $4.5 billion available until September 2022.
     
  • Delivering Emergency Rental Assistance—unavailable in previous winters—to help cover utility bills: First established last December—and provided an additional $21.5 billion in funding by the American Rescue Plan—Emergency Rental Assistance (ERA) programs provide help with past-due utility bills or ongoing assistance with energy costs to help distressed renters avoid shut-offs and keep current on expenses. Even as most programs were just beginning to ramp up between January and June 2021, grantees made over 200,000 payments to support households with utility arrears and over 140,000 prospective utility payments.
     
  • Providing state, local and tribal governments additional resources to help energy-burdened middle-class families, including through the $350 billion State & Local Fiscal Recovery Fund: States and localities have the flexibility to use Fiscal Recovery Funds to help deliver energy relief to families, including for middle-class households that may not be eligible for programs directed to the lowest income consumers.

Today the White House called on Utilities and Energy Providers to Commit to Proactively Use Their Resources to Help

The Administration welcomed initial commitments from several utility companies including DTE Energy, Eversource, National Grid, NorthWestern Energy and Portland General Electric, as well as the delivered fuel trade association NEFI, that all agreed to the following:

  • Identify Eligible Recipients: Many utility companies already offer programs to help families in need. Utilities should proactively identify those who may be eligible for public benefits, such as LIHEAP and ERA, using financial hardship and other customer data. In order to help identify and prequalify customers for benefits, utilities can also use third-party data – such as whether a home is rented or owned and which census tract it is in – and data through partnership with government agencies including income or proxies, like eligibility for other programs. For example, in Connecticut, utilities are using third-party data to pre-qualify and contact customers, and share the results with state agencies to expedite energy assistance payments.
     
  • Directly Screen and Notify Potentially Eligible Recipients: Utilities and energy providers should inform customers of energy assistance programs, screen customers for benefits eligibility, and facilitate referrals to available benefits programs prior to any shut-offs.
     
  • Expedite Assistance to Vulnerable Households: Energy providers should be critical partners by proactively working to establish the processes and data-sharing relationships needed to speed benefits to their eligible customers as quickly as possible. For example, in Michigan, utilities work in partnership with the state to receive bundled payments on behalf of many customers at once, speeding processing and helping benefits quickly reach their customer’s accounts. In South Carolina, utility companies receive a bulk payment from the state prior to the full satisfaction of application and documentation requirements that they can use to apply benefits to customers quickly.
     
  • No Shutoffs for Customers Applying for Financial Hardship Assistance: Beyond state or local shut-off moratoria requirements, when utility companies are notified that a customer is applying for financial hardship assistance, including energy assistance benefits, they should commit to restore service or delay shut-off. For example, in Michigan, once a household applies for ERA utility benefits, the utility company places a hold on utility shut off. Utilities should also commit to provide at least 30 days’ notice to all customers before a shut-off.
     
  • Facilitate Assistance to Delivered Fuel Customers: In order to expedite benefits, providers of delivered fuels should commit to proactively notify families in distress of how to contact a state and local agency for assistance. Fuel providers with capacity should set up processes to facilitate referrals with customer permission. Fuel providers should prioritize deliveries to households approved for benefits, particularly where providers receive direct deposits credited to customer accounts prior to or immediately following delivery. Fuel providers with capacity should go even further by agreeing to deliver fuels to approved households through deferred payment or budgeting agreements.

Today the Administration also called on States, Localities and Tribes to:
 
Prepare Early to Distribute Expanded LIHEAP to More Families

  • Strong and Effective Winter Plans: The Administration is providing technical assistance to LIHEAP grantees to speed up state and local planning and program implementation for winter.
     
  • Quick and Automatic Distribution of Benefits: HHS is urging grantees to consider expediting payments to households that have benefitted from LIHEAP in previous years and simplifying eligibility verification. This option will not be appropriate for all grantees, but some states have already shown it can work. For example, Maine and New York are providing automatic payments to households who have received benefits in the past.
     
  • Expanded Outreach to Newly Eligible Households: HHS is urging grantees to consider additional outreach to households who need energy assistance for the first time this year. A significant number of households receive LIHEAP year after year, but as a result of the economic disruption of the pandemic and rising energy prices additional households are expected to need help. These households may be unfamiliar with how to access benefits, and grantees can help these families access the unprecedented LIHEAP resources available as well as refer to other benefits.
     
  • Coordination between LIHEAP, ERA and Other Programs: Given differences in eligibility, HHS and Treasury are clarifying how grantees of LIHEAP and ERA can coordinate to quickly provide benefits to eligible households. Coordination ensures support can reach a greater number of households, including those who do not qualify for LIHEAP due to their household incomes, people on fixed incomes, the elderly, and others in need. These best practices include coordinating outreach to households, establishing regular communication with program leaders and energy providers, streamlining intake, and referring across programs as appropriate. For example, rental households not fully served by LIHEAP could be referred to ERA, and homeowners could be referred to LIHEAP. Where available, the Homeowners Assistance Fund may be able to serve middle-class homeowner households.

 Use of Emergency Rental Assistance to Aid Renters with Utility Costs

  • Provide Forward-Looking Assistance to Low-income Renters Facing High Energy Costs: The Treasury Department is encouraging grantees to take advantage of the flexibility to provide forward-looking utility assistance payments over the next several months to low-income families facing high heating costs, including for those renters who rely on delivered fuels to heat their homes. ERA grantees may also cover arrears and related fees for utility bills dating back to the start of the pandemic.
     
  • Lower Burdens and Speed Assistance to Distressed Renters Through Collaboration between ERA Program Administrators and Utility Providers: The Administration is facilitating cooperation between state and local governments and utility providers to identify customers at risk of energy insecurity and confirm household eligibility. To support this effort, the Treasury Department has issued guidance encouraging grantees to establish data sharing agreements and bulk payment methods with utility providers.
     
  • Expedite Payments Through Partnerships with Non-Profits to Prevent the Loss of Utility Services: When the rapid delivery of a payment could reasonably be necessary to prevent the loss of utility services, Treasury has provided grantees flexibility to partner with nonprofit organizations for the purpose of making immediate payments while a household’s application is still being processed.
     
  • Increased Home Heating Costs Can Qualify Income-Eligible Households for Needed Assistance this Winter. The Treasury Department is clarifying that elevated energy costs may be a form of COVID-19-related hardship that puts distressed renters at-risk of housing instability qualifying them for assistance with their utilities. Households can self-attest to experiencing both a COVID-related hardship and risk of housing instability based on significant increases in their home heating costs.

Use All Available Tools to Help Working and Middle-Class Families

  • State and Local Fiscal Recovery Fund Can Help Families Ineligible for Other Support: States, localities and tribes can tap the $350 billion allocated by the American Rescue Plan to provide additional relief on home heating costs, particularly to middle-class households. For example, Louisville has supported a utility relief fund that provides residents who have fallen behind on gas or electric bills a one-time credit of up to $1,000.
     
  • $10 Billion Homeowners Assistance Fund to help Distressed Homeowners Keep Up with Utility Bills: Treasury is encouraging states, tribes and territories to utilize funds from this American Rescue Plan program to help cover home energy costs or prevent the loss of utilities this winter, including for hard-pressed middle-class families.
     
  • $1 Billion Pandemic Emergency Assistance Fund: The American Rescue Plan also created a new fund for states, territories and tribes of which a substantial portion remains and is available to provide cash or utility-specific assistance to needy families. 

The Administration also Highlighted Additional Financial Support Helping Hard-Pressed Families with Energy Costs:

  • 1/3 of Families Using Child Tax Credit for Utility Bills: Thanks to the American Rescue Plan, the families of more than 61 million children are receiving expanded monthly Child Tax Credit payments up to $300 per child and nearly a third used it to pay for utilities –including home energy costs – between July and October 2021.
     
  • Weatherization Assistance to Reduce Energy Costs: The bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act invests a historic $3.5 billion in the Department of Energy’s Weatherization Assistance Program, reducing energy costs for more than 700,000 low-income households by increasing the energy efficiency of their homes.
     
  • $100 million to Cover Rent and Utilities in Hard-Hit Rural Areas: The American Rescue Plan is providing financial support through September 2022 to over 26,000 overburdened rural households living in multi-family housing financed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
  • Preventing Families from Choosing “Heat or Eat”: More low-income children and families face hunger when energy prices rise during winter as higher home heating costs eat up family budgets. The Biden-Harris Administration increased Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits on October 1 by an average of $36.24 per month, which will help to prevent this cruel tradeoff between heat and food this winter.
Biden Administration, Coronavirus Pandemic, Health Care, News & Photo Features, President Joe Biden, Public Health

Biden Administration to Invest $7 Billion to Hire Public Health Workers, Rebuild Public Health Departments

Funding Will Create Tens of Thousands of Jobs to Respond to COVID-19, Prepare U.S. for Future Outbreaks, and Support Local Public Health Officials
 
As Vaccine for Adolescents Comes Online, Administration Sets Aside Dedicated Funding for School Nurses, Who Can Help Provide Information about Vaccinations

 

The Biden-Harris Administration will invest $7.4 billion from the American Rescue Plan to recruit and hire public health workers to respond to the pandemic and prepare for future public health challenges. The funding will allow the United States to expand its public health workforce, creating tens of thousands of jobs to support vaccinations, testing, contact tracing, and community outreach, and strengthen America’s future public health infrastructure. © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

Even as the CDC is lifting mask and social-distancing requirements for fully vaccinated people, the Biden Administration is looking to the long-term health of the nation, our ability to get through COVID-19, but also be well positioned for the next pandemic or public health crisis. The Biden-Harris Administration announced it would invest $7.4 billion from the American Rescue Plan to recruit and hire public health workers and also redress the fact that over the past several decades, public health departments have been hollowed out. The White House provided this fact sheet:

As part of its ongoing COVID-19 response efforts, the Biden-Harris Administration will invest $7.4 billion from the American Rescue Plan to recruit and hire public health workers to respond to the pandemic and prepare for future public health challenges. The COVID-19 pandemic has reinforced that public health workers are essential, providing critical services to keep Americans safe and healthy. The funding announced today will allow the United States to expand its public health workforce, creating tens of thousands of jobs to support vaccinations, testing, contact tracing, and community outreach, and strengthen America’s future public health infrastructure.
 
The Biden-Harris Administration will invest $4.4 billion to allow states and localities to expand their over-stretched public health departments with additional staff to support COVID-19 response efforts. This funding will support a range of public health roles, including funding for Disease Intervention Specialists to do contact tracing, case management, and support outbreak investigations, and dedicated funding to hire school nurses to help schools safely reopen and remain open for in-person instruction. Additionally, funds will support the development of the next generation of public health leaders by creating a Public Health AmeriCorps and expanding CDC’s Epidemic Intelligence Service – the renowned program that equips workers to identify and contain public health outbreaks.
 
Finally, CDC will use $3 billion from the American Rescue Plan to create a new grant program that will facilitate federal investment in the people and expertise needed at the state and local levels to expand, train, and modernize the public health workforce for the future. In the months ahead, CDC will work with leaders from across the public health community to design this new grant program.
 
All awardees of this American Rescue Plan funding will be asked to prioritize recruiting individuals from the communities they will serve and from backgrounds underrepresented in critical public health professions.
 
Today’s funding builds on the President’s announcement last week of $250 million to help community -based organizations hire and mobilize community outreach workers and social support specialists to increase access to vaccinations in the hardest-hit and highest risk communities. 
 
The Biden-Harris Administration will:
 
Invest $4.4 Billion to Surge Public Health Staffing for COVID-19 Response
 
Help States and Localities Increase their Public Health Staffing and Expertise:  State and local public health heroes have led the fight against COVID-19 for more than a year. Often understaffed and lacking resources, local public health departments have provided critical services during the pandemic, including setting up testing sites, leading local vaccination efforts, and delivering personal protective equipment, therapeutics, and care to those in need. Thanks to the American Rescue Plan, CDC will fund $3.4 billion in new hiring for state and local public health departments to quickly add staff to support critical COVID-19 response efforts – including vaccination outreach and administration efforts, testing and contact tracing, epidemiologists, data scientists, and other vital public health functions. This funding includes at least $500 million for the hiring of school nurses, who can offer medical expertise to support parents and teens as vaccination options for younger people expand. This builds on resources in the American Rescue Plan’s Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund which can also be used to hire school nurses.
 
Launch Public Health AmeriCorps: At a time of unprecedented interest in public health, CDC and AmeriCorps (the Corporation for National and Community Service) will launch the Public Health AmeriCorps – a $400 million investment from the American Rescue Plan to recruit and build a new workforce ready to respond to the public health needs of the nation. The program will focus on building a diverse pipeline for the public health workforce and providing direct service to communities across the country. The partnership will leverage the expertise of both agencies, capitalizing on AmeriCorps’ experience managing some of the most prominent public service and workforce development programs in the nation while benefitting from CDC’s technical expertise as the country’s leading public health agency.
 
Recruit and Train Public Health Leaders: CDC will expand its current workforce programs, including the Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS). EIS is a national, deployable, cutting-edge public health workforce that responds to local outbreaks. Over the past seven decades, EIS officers have served as boots-on-the-ground epidemiologists during some of the most severe outbreaks and public health emergencies, including the Ebola outbreak, H1N1, the Flint water crisis, Zika, and the COVID-19 pandemic. With $245 million from the American Rescue Plan, CDC will increase support for programs including EIS, the Undergraduate Public Health Scholars Program, and the Dr. James A. Ferguson Emerging Infectious Diseases RISE Fellowship, which offers students from underrepresented background the opportunity to study infectious diseases and health disparities. Expanding these programs will support workforce diversity in public health to help reduce longstanding health disparities and inequities. In addition, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology will invest $80 million to train public health professionals to help modernize the public health data infrastructure, with a focus on recruiting from minority serving institutions and universities.
 
Building the Laboratory Workforce and Building Capacity for Future Outbreaks: With $337 million from the American Rescue Plan, CDC will strengthen the public health laboratory workforce pipeline. CDC will expand the current public health laboratory fellowship programs for laboratory science graduates and implement a new public health internship program for undergraduate students to gain experiences in public health laboratory settings. Funds will improve the capacity of the nation’s public-private clinical laboratory infrastructure to support rapid, large-scale responses to public health emergencies.
 
Invest $3 Billion to Prepare for Future Pandemics
 
Create a New Program to Modernize the Public Health Workforce: CDC will create a new grant program to provide under-resourced health departments with the support they need to hire staff and build a strong public health workforce. This grant program will offer community health workers and others hired for the COVID-19 response an opportunity to continue their careers beyond the pandemic as public health professionals. CDC will convene federal, state, local, and territorial public health experts to inform the design and focus of this new grant program. Ultimately, the program will allow the United States to continue to support the nation’s public health infrastructure, particularly in lower-income and underserved communities.

Biden Administration, Economic Development, Economic Policies, Economy, Government spending, Jobs, Joe Biden, News & Photo Features, President Joe Biden, Women's Issues

Biden Administration Releases $39 Billion from American Rescue Plan to Address Child Care Crisis

The Biden Administration has recognized that the availability of affordable child care is the essential grease to the economy’s gears. The White House has issued a fact sheet detailing $39 billion in American Rescue Plan funding to states “to rescue the child care industry so the economy can recover”© Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

The Biden Administration has recognized that the availability of affordable child care is the essential grease to the economy’s gears. The White House has issued a fact sheet detailing $39 billion in American Rescue Plan funding “to rescue the child care industry so the economy can recover”:

Today, the Biden Administration is announcing the release of $39 billion of American Rescue Plan funds to states, territories, and tribes to address the child care crisis caused by COVID-19. These funds will help early childhood educators and family child care providers keep their doors open. These providers have been on the frontlines caring for the children of essential workers and support parents, especially mothers, who want to get back to work. These funds are a critical step to pave the way for a strong economic recovery and a more equitable future.

Over the past 40 years, as more women entered the labor force and brought home larger paychecks, they have driven 91 percent of the income gains experienced by middle-class families. But, since the start of the COVID-19 public health emergency, roughly 2 million women have left the labor force, disproportionately due to caregiving needs and undoing decades of progress improving women’s labor force participation rate. Even as many fathers have returned to work, mothers, especially those without a four-year college degree, have not done so at similar rates. As a result, the gender earnings gap is predicted to increase by 5 percentage points in this recession, hurting our families and economy. As women work to regain employment, families with young children, and especially families of color where mothers are more likely to be sole or primary breadwinners, may face financial burdens for years to come. Parents need access to safe, quality child care to get back to work.

Source: Pandemic pushes mothers of young children out of the labor force | Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis (minneapolisfed.org)

 
At the same time, early childhood and child care providers – nearly all small businesses, overwhelmingly owned by women and disproportionately owned by people of color – have been hit hard by the pandemic and are struggling to continue to provide essential services. Providers have faced decreasing revenues due to lower enrollment while also shouldering higher expenses – 47 percent higher by one estimate – for personal protective equipment (PPE), sanitation, additional staff, and other needs to operate safely. They were already operating on extremely thin margins before the pandemic. According to one survey, as of December, about one in four child care providers open at the start of the pandemic were closed, hindering access to care, especially for families of color. These closures exacerbated access challenges that existed before the pandemic when half of all Americans lived in a child care desert. Child care providers who have stayed open have gone to enormous lengths to do so: two in five providers report taking on debt for their programs using personal credit cards to pay for increased costs and three in five work in programs that have reduced expenses through layoffs, furloughs, or pay cuts. One in six child care jobs, generally held by women of color, still haven’t come back – much more than the one in twenty jobs that have been lost throughout the economy. 

That is why President Biden prioritized addressing the child care crisis caused by COVID-19 as part of the American Rescue Plan. Today’s $39 billion funding release will provide a lifeline to hundreds of thousands of childcare providers and early childhood educators, provide a safe and healthy learning environment for more than 5 million children, and help parents, especially mothers, get back to work. States, tribes, and territories can use these funds to:

  • Help hundreds of thousands child care centers and family child care providers, which are mostly very small businesses, stay open or reopen including by making rent or mortgage payments, helping with utility or insurance bills, maintaining or improving facilities, and paying off debt incurred during the pandemic.
  • Support providers with funds to enable safe and healthy learning environments for more than 5 million of children, including by purchasing masks, implementing physical distancing, improving ventilation, and cleaning consistently, so both centers and family providers can comply with CDC’s Guidance for Operating Child Care Programs during COVID-19. This funding complements the President’s efforts to prioritize early childhood educators for vaccination – child care workers remain eligible for vaccinations and nearly 80 percent of the educators who work with children from birth to 12th grade received at least their first shot of a COVID-19 vaccine during the month of March. Providers can also use these funds to support the mental health of both children and early educators so that they can meet any social and emotional needs exacerbated by the pandemic as centers reopen and parents go back to work.
  • Keep child care workers, disproportionately women of color and immigrants, on the payroll and rehire those who have been laid off. Child care workers are essential to meeting the child care needs of families and providing quality are to children, but providers have been forced to lay off, furlough, or reduce pay of workers to survive – exacerbating issues faced by a workforce that has long faced low pay and high turnover. Providers can use these funds to keep workers on payroll, rehire laid off workers and recruit new workers, and increase the pay and benefits of child care workers and family child care providers.
  • Provide families with the greatest need access to affordable care. States, tribes, and territories can provide direct subsidies to more than 800,000 hard-pressed families earning below 85% state median income and families performing essential work, to help cover the cost of care.
  • Start to lay the foundation for a stronger child care system, so families can access the high-quality care they need. As states, tribes, and territories address the immediate crisis, they can also make a down payment on President Biden’s commitment to a stronger, more equitable early childhood education system. For example, states, tribes, and territories can set reimbursement rates at a level that will help children receive high-quality care and can increase access to care, including on the evenings and weekends when many essential workers need care. 

The American Rescue Plan also included an historic increase in support for child care through the tax code, helping millions of working families afford needed care. Last year, a family claiming a Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit (CDCTC) got less than $700 on average towards the cost of care, and many low-income working families often got nothing. Thanks to the historic expansion of the CDCTC in the American Recovery Plan, a median income family with two kids under age 13 will receive up to $8,000 towards their child care expenses when they file taxes for 2021, compared with a maximum of $1,200 previously.

  • In 2020, the CDCTC provides a tax credit typically capped at $600 for one child, for families with at least $3,000 in eligible expenses, and capped at $1,200 for two children or more for families with at least $6,000 in child care expenses.
  • Under the American Rescue Plan’s expansion of the CDCTC, all families with incomes below $125,000 will save up to half the cost of their eligible child care expenses, getting back up to $4,000 for one child and $8,000 for two or more children, when they file taxes for 2021. And, families making between $125,000 and $438,000 can receive a partial credit.
  • And for the first time, the CDCTC will be fully refundable, making the credit fairer by allowing low-income working families to receive the full value of the credit towards their eligible child care expenses regardless of how much they owe on their 2021 taxes.

In the coming weeks, the administration will release:

  • Guidance to states, tribes, and territories, while also providing technical assistance like webinars and peer-to-peer learning opportunities, to support states, tribes, and territories as they make historic investments in saving and rebuilding their child care systems, provide high-quality care to children, and get families back to work.
  • Frequently Asked Questions on the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit to equip parents with the information they need to claim the credit next year.

Help from the American Rescue Plan is coming to states, territories, and tribes. The $39 billion will be provided through two funds: (1) $24 billion in child care stabilization funding for child care providers to reopen or stay open, provide safe and healthy learning environments, keep workers on payroll, and provide mental health supports for educators and children, and (2) $15 billion in more flexible funding for states to make child care more affordable for more families, increase access to high-quality care for families receiving subsidies, increase compensation for early childhood workers, and meet other care needs in their states. A breakdown by state, tribe and territory is below.
 

 Child Care Development Fund Flexible FundingChild Care Stabilization FundingTotal
TOTAL            14,960,830,000                 23,975,000,000       38,935,830,000
STATES
Alabama                 281,637,028              451,360,337            732,997,365
Alaska                   28,288,483                45,336,010              73,624,493
Arizona                 372,151,615              596,421,853            968,573,468
Arkansas                 178,509,626              286,085,126            464,594,752
California              1,443,355,294           2,313,166,479         3,756,521,773
Colorado                 178,553,958              286,156,175           464,710,133
Connecticut                 106,000,358              169,879,499            275,879,857
Delaware                   41,652,009                66,752,817            108,404,826
District of Columbia                   24,860,559                39,842,313              64,702,872
Florida                 950,379,359           1,523,107,778         2,473,487,137
Georgia                 604,180,514              968,278,648         1,572,459,162
Hawaii                   49,850,222                79,891,531            129,741,753
Idaho                   86,458,222              138,560,660            225,018,882
Illinois                 496,853,094              796,272,357         1,293,125,451
Indiana                 337,076,458              540,209,308            877,285,766
Iowa                 141,985,752              227,550,820            369,536,572
Kansas                 133,466,378              213,897,405            347,363,783
Kentucky                 293,307,790              470,064,268            763,372,058
Louisiana                 296,835,564              475,717,989            772,553,553
Maine                   45,660,198                73,176,466            118,836,664
Maryland                 192,855,570              309,076,387            501,931,957
Massachusetts                 196,164,566              314,379,488           510,544,054
Michigan                 437,223,904              700,708,746         1,137,932,650
Minnesota                 202,291,045              324,197,976            526,489,021
Mississippi                 199,344,951              319,476,474            518,821,425
Missouri                 277,132,195              444,140,749            721,272,944
Montana                   42,477,481                68,075,745            110,553,226
Nebraska                   89,286,484              143,093,320            232,379,804
Nevada                 138,787,492              222,425,189            361,212,681
New Hampshire                   29,736,767                47,657,076              77,393,843
New Jersey                 266,779,051              427,548,476            694,327,527
New Mexico                 122,970,798              197,076,859            320,047,657
New York                 701,659,170           1,124,501,000         1,826,160,170
North Carolina                 502,777,789              805,767,459         1,308,545,248
North Dakota                   29,109,192                46,651,304              75,760,496
Ohio                 499,067,750              799,821,634         1,298,889,384
Oklahoma                 226,430,561              362,884,723            589,315,284
Oregon                 155,312,363              248,908,466            404,220,829
Pennsylvania                 454,791,980              728,863,896         1,183,655,876
Rhode Island                   35,723,344                57,251,352              92,974,696
South Carolina                 272,416,120              436,582,621            708,998,741
South Dakota                   38,618,949                61,891,939            100,510,888
Tennessee                 345,950,731              554,431,495            900,382,226
Texas              1,699,934,795           2,724,368,837         4,424,303,632
Utah                 163,100,176              261,389,459            424,489,635
Vermont                   18,302,749                29,332,561              47,635,310
Virginia                 304,876,959              488,605,381            793,482,340
Washington                 243,089,298              389,582,536            632,671,834
West Virginia                 100,070,363              160,375,904            260,446,267
Wisconsin                 222,761,422              357,004,444            579,765,866
Wyoming                   18,285,260                29,304,530              47,589,790
Totals for States 14,318,391,756 22,947,103,865 37,265,495,621
TERRITORIES
 Child Care Development Fund Flexible FundingChild Care Stabilization FundingTotal
American Samoa                   19,083,903                30,522,786              49,606,689
Guam                   27,498,602                43,981,253              71,479,855
Northern Mariana Islands                   13,934,049                22,286,113              36,220,162
Puerto Rico                 117,788,244              188,771,135            306,559,379
Virgin Islands                   14,433,446                23,084,848              37,518,294
Totals for Territories                 192,738,244 308,646,135 501,384,379
TRIBES


 		Child Care Development Fund Flexible FundingChild Care Stabilization FundingTotal
Tribes                 449,700,000               719,250,000         1,168,950,000
Totals for Tribes                 449,700,000              719,250,000         1,168,950,000