Attached are three spreadsheets to aide in your discussions on developing a final spending plan for the $10.5 million allocation from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA).

The first spreadsheet is entitled TOWN OF PURCELLVILLE - ARPA CSLFRF ALLOCATION PLAN 60/15/15/10. This spreadsheet simply shows the total amount of allocation that would be available for broadband and water and sewer capital improvements, which totals $7.9 million, and business support at $1.5 million with all other categories at $1.0 million.

In looking at the water and sewer capital improvement needs and the availability of other funding from the USDA loan to fulfill some of these objectives, the second spreadsheet entitled TOWN OF PURCELLVILLE - ARPA CSLFRF ALLOCATION SPENDING PLAN PER TC RECOMMENDATION - provides a more detailed spending plan meeting the percent allocation distribution as suggested by the Council at its last meeting of July 13. Please note that specific projects, such as the cast iron water mains, are being recommended not to be funded with the ARPA, but rather to continue our application process requesting assistance from the forty year low interest loan opportunity provided by the USDA. Category C, the Hirst Farm Pond Conversion, has been directed by Council for the administration to solicit possible assistance from the County to complete this project. Additional funding from any source will secure our existing funding previously received from the Commonwealth, the County and the town's General Fund funds which have been encumbered as match for these outside funding agencies.

The third spreadsheet entitled TOWN OF PURCELLVILLE - APRA CSLFRF ALLOCATION SPENDING PLAN - STAFF RECOMMENDATION - is a staff recommendation to modify the Council's suggested percentages of allocation which increases the amount of dollars which would finance water and wastewater capital improvements. As you can see from this table, staff has maintained the same percentages as Council for the broadband initiative at 15%, but increases water and wastewater CIP to 72%. This is achievable by reducing the amount of direct business support from 15% to 6%. While that may appear to be significant, I want to remind the Council that on the Stantec analysis as presented on November 20, 2019, that with the revised rate methodology which we have currently adopted, combined with Stantec's recommendations to redistribute the burden of water and sewer billing on our commercial businesses achieves a significant long-term benefit to our commercial business partners by greatly reducing their annual cost of water and sewer service. 

I am enclosing a table from the November 20, 2019 Council workshop, which shows the dramatic savings to our business community by the adoption of the new rate methodology. Our new rate methodology redistributes financial burden more equitably creating huge annual savings to our business community, especially those businesses that utilize high volumes of water. It is my contention that the saving values shown on this table have now substantially increased due to the Council's recent restructuring and refinancing strategy of our water and sewer debt. A reanalysis of this table should demonstrate additional annual savings to our business community as we remove water and sewer capital improvements from the dependency of financing debt with water and sewer rates. In other words, the more water and sewer capital improvements we make with federal dollars will substantially provide annual savings to our business community at significantly higher levels than any one-year business grant program could provide. 

I would be happy to discuss with Stantec, a revision of this table. Should the Council be interested in having this table revised to reflect the cumulative savings that our business community will receive from the three previous policy changes (rate restructuring, debt restructuring, debt refinancing) and potential future savings by increasing the amount of water and wastewater CIP funded through other dollars in lieu of water and sewer rates.  Simply put, the best way to achieve support to our business community is to give them a long-term, sustainable benefit by lessening the burden that will potentially pay for water and sewer services by shifting the percent allocation to show a higher level of federal spending above the recommended 60% that the Council suggested at its last meeting.