At its September 26 city council meeting, the City of Sparks approved the spending plan for the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds received in the amount of $16,230,272. This allocation was received from the federal government to address the social, health, and economic impacts created by the COVID-19 pandemic. The first half of the $16.2 million was deposited into the City’s account in May 2021 and the second half was received at the end of June of this year.
One hundred thousand dollars of that will be evaluated by the Sparks Senior Citizens Advisory Committee to discuss how that should be best put towards improving senior services, led by the city manager.
Along with the $100,000 funds earmarked for senior services (which could also include a plan for rental housing mitigation), the Sparks City Council also agreed to use American Rescue Plan Act funds to work with the Food Bank of Northern Nevada for reimbursing expenses incurred towards addressing food insecurity (in the amount of $300k), and one million dollars to go towards Northern Nevada HOPES in constructing its clinic on East Fourth Street.
Like most federal funds appointed to a particular local government, ARPA funds must be used within a certain timeframe and for specified purposes. With the City of Sparks, ARPA monies must be assigned by the end of 2024 and spent by the end of 2026 and must go toward: 1) addressing the public economic and health impacts of the pandemic; 2) increased pay for essential workers; and 3) investments in sewer, water, and broadband infrastructure.
Along with these funds, entities could’ve also elected to claim a standard allowance of $10 million in lost revenue. At an April 2025 City Council meeting, Sparks councilmembers approved a conceptual spending plan for the ARPA allocation and accepted the $10 million lost revenue funding. The bulk of that “lost revenue” funding went towards the NV Cares Campus capital contribution ($3.9 million) and the building of Fire Station 6 (in the amount of $4.25 million) as noted in the city’s original and revised conceptual spending plans.
In early June of this year, the City of Sparks received an invoice from Washoe County for $767,157 which was for the regional Incident Management Team formed in March of 2020 that handled the regional response to COVID-19. Since this was not a budgeted expenditure, ARPA funds were able to be used to pay the invoice and the original conceptual spending plan to be revised.
In the September 26 meeting, Councilman Kristopher Dahir expressed concern about running out of ARPA funds before addressing the housing and rental mitigation issue. City Manager Neil Krutz reaffirmed that the conceptual plan can be approved to release the monies on some of the other issues in the agenda, and then amended again to create a new bucket for ARPA funds to be used for tackling the rental assistance problem to be discussed at another meeting. The agenda item 9.10 regarding the revised conceptual spending plan for the $16 million ARPA allocation was approved unanimously.
For more information or to see the details about the allocation of ARPA funds within the City of Sparks, visit https://www.cityofsparks.us and go to its “Agendas” page.
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