ARPA Funding

What is ARPA Funding?

On March 11, 2021, President Biden signed the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) into law. Governments across the country received funds to help combat the negative effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Through ARPA, the Town of Indian Trail received $12.7 million to assist in response to the pandemic and rebuild a stronger community.

How Can ARPA Funding be Spent?

The federal government outlined five categories where funding can be spent.

Addressing COVID Public Health - to utilize funding to better support public health. As public health is handled through Union County, the Town does not have many funding opportunities in this category.
Addressing COVID Economic Impact - where COVID created additional harm to citizens aside from health concerns.
Replacing Lost Revenue - municipalities can take a maximum Revenue Replacement Allowance of $10 million. The Town has chosen to take the maximum Revenue Replacement Allowance.
Providing Premium Pay - government employees who worked through the pandemic experienced a greater risk of contracting COVID-19. This category would provide hazard pay to those eligible employees
Infrastructure Investment - making necessary investments to provide or improve access to clean drinking water, improving wastewater, stormwater infrastructure and expanding access to broadband internet. Stormwater infrastructure is the only item in this category where the Town could use ARPA funds.

ARPA Funds

Revenue Replacement

The Town of Indian Trail chose to take the standard Revenue Replacement Allowance of $10 million, the maximum amount allowed by ARPA. The Town will use these funds to pay for the Union County Sheriff’s Office contract for the next two-and-a-half years, which is an allowable use under ARPA. This will create $10 million in surplus general funds to be used for various projects that will help support the community.

Stormwater Projects

Of the remaining $2.5 million of ARPA funds, $431,431 will be used for stormwater projects, including culvert replacements and drainage/ditch rehabilitation.

Premium Pay

The Town Council approved premium pay for the Town staff, totaling a one-time payment of $211,000.

Remaining ARPA Funds to Allocate

The Town has approximately $1.3 million in remaining ARPA funding to allocate to additional infrastructure and stormwater projects.

Town Funds

ARPA-Enabled Funds

To date, the Town has dedicated the following available ARPA-enabled funds:

Fiscal Year 2025

For Fiscal Year 2025, the Indian Trail Town Council voted to use the interest earned on the ARPA dollars from July 2023 through June 2024 to fund outside agencies, which totals approximately $263,000. During a call for projects in March and April 2024, the Town received 16 applications. On May 28, 2024, the Town Council voted to fund the following projects:

$35,363 to Food for Families
$20,500 to Common Heart
$14,281 to the Union County Chapter of the Firefighters’ Burned Children’s Fund
$15,000 to the Union West Rotary
$55,000 to the Union County Charter Education Association, Inc.
$35,000 to the Union Day School
$27,292 to the Hemby Bridge Fire Department
$45,011 to the Union County Council on Aging
$11,412 to the Help Pregnancy Center

On May 28, the Town Council also voted to allocate the remaining $1,803,924 of ARPA-enabled funds, along with $183,000 originally allotted to the Public Works/Sheriff’s Office building upfit to a Capital Reserve Fund for the Multi-Generational Community Center.

Fiscal Year 2024

In the Fiscal Year 2024 budget, the Indian Trail Town Council voted to use the interest earned on the ARPA dollars from July 2022 through June 2023 to fund outside agencies, which totaled $334,711. Additionally, in October, the Town Council voted to use $27,283 of the available $57,000 in ARPA interest income set aside for FY 2025 to fully fund the FY 2024 project requests from Indian Trail Elementary and Poplin Elementary.

During a call for projects in August 2023, the Town received 12 applications totaling $1,333,532. The Town Council voted to fund the following projects:

$193,283 to Union County Public Schools that serve Indian Trail students:
1. $90,000 to primary schools
2. $103,283 to secondary schools
$4,000 to the Union County Education Foundation
$15,000 to the STeAM Children’s Studio
$40,570 to the Union County Charter Educational Association
$75,000 to the Community Shelter of Union County
$5,500 to the Safer Community Ministry
$1,500 to the HELP Pregnancy Center
$27,141 to the Moore Park waterline extension (50% of design costs)*

*The Moores Park waterline project is dependent on Union County agreeing to a 50/50 partnership for the total cost of the project. The County deferred deciding on this project until FY 25, which begins July 1, 2024; however, the $27,141 the Indian Trail Town Council originally allocated to the project must be spent in FY 24. As such, on May 14, the Town Council voted to use those dollars to fund four-and-a-half of the projects that applied for FY 25 ARPA-enabled funds. Those projects are as follows:

$8,224 to Union County Crisis Assistance Ministry
$6,000 to EC K-5 Sardis Elementary School
$5,500 to David’s Advocacy for the Homeless
$5,082 to Hemby Bridge Elementary School PTO
$2,335 to the Hemby Bridge Fire Department

Fiscal Year 2023

$346,085 to the Porter Ridge and Indian Trail Athletic Associations
$4,327,215 for fire trucks for the Baker’s, Hemby Bridge, and Stallings Fire Departments (half to be paid in FY23 and half to be paid in FY24)
$125,780 to the James B. Crump VFW Post 2423
$200,000 to Cameron's House of Hope
$400,000 toward water lines for Indian Trail residents in the Emerald Woods subdivision who are on well water
$290,000 to Food for Families
$164,000 to the Union West Rotary
$10,000 to the Indian Trail Lion's Club
$200,000 to Common Heart
$90,000 for the purchase of a minibus for the Town Hall/Parks and Recreation