SUN-GAZETTE FILE PHOTO Trade & Transit Centre II hosts Williamsport City Council meetings.

The City of Williamsport has approved a substantial amendment to its American Rescue Plan Home funding, a change that is expected to assist a service agency providing assistance to prevent and deal with the ongoing crisis of homelessness.

The amendment was presented by a resolution proposal from Valerie Fessler, executive director of the city department of community and economic development with assistance from Jamie Shrawder of SEDA-Council of Governments which is assisting with the administrative needs on federal entitlement and funding programs.

The city received $888,134 in American Rescue Plan (ARP) home funds in 2021 as part of the national effort to assist cities that sustained losses due to the impact of COVID-19. Those funds were specified to be used to further the work of homelessness service providers in the city, Fessler said, turning over the bulk of the explanation for the request to Shrawder.

The city originally allocated funds to the YWCA of Northcentral Pennsylvania for its acquisition and development of non-congregate shelter work and also to no one in particular for the development of affordable rental housing, Shrawder said.

However, the city did not get any proposals from developers for the development of the rental housing piece and the piece with the YWCA for the non-congregate shelter work, she added.

Once SEDA-COG reviewed all of the regulations that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) had in place for the ARP home program, it was discovered that the YWCA could not meet all of those regulations.

For example, the regulations wanted to see each new unit have its own bathroom and there was not sufficient space at the YWCA for that.

However, it is SEDA-COG’s recommendation that ARP funding go instead to STEP Inc., moving funding from out of the non-congregate shelter and the development of rental housing to that service agency.

STEP also did not need as much operating funds as was originally allocated.

That explanation drew questions from the council.

Councilwoman Liz Miele asked if STEP’s need for additional support of services funding is going to fund new support of services or is that backfilling funds that they did not receive in some other area.

“I think it is a combination of both,” Shrawder remarked.

There will be new programs that will be available through ARP home funds and there are multiple things that STEP can do with the funds to prevent and deal with homelessness.

These include, but are not limited to, housing counseling, mental health counseling, rental assistance, transportation assistance – a lot of categories that they could put funding towards.

Fessler said in fact one of the things that Rachelle Abbott, president and CEO of STEP Inc. recently shared with the department is that they had a funding source that either the organization was seeking or had previously received from that was not renewed.

“It was helping individuals who were staying under Code Blue Shelter at First Church,” Fessle said. What STEP was providing was essentially case management services for those individuals, she said. “They’re funding sources that they had for that fell through and so we will be able to fund that with these funds and I’m really excited about that personally,” Fessler said.

Miele then asked if the funding got them an additional year or longer than that.

Fessler said she believed it would be a three-year spend down.

“They have to have these funds spent by the end of 2030,” Fessler said.

In all, the city received $25.4 million in ARPA funding.

Council voted to approve the substantial amendment to the ARP home funds.