Longmont should get about $11 million from the recently passed federal stimulus package to be used for various city programs and agencies to help recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, City Manager Harold Dominguez said.
President Joe Biden signed the relief package into law on Thursday.
The city’s recovery management team is determining where Longmont’s cut of the federal funding could be used, Dominguez said during a video interview Thursday.
“They are digging into it right now,” Domiguez said. “We will get a better sense of it next week.”
The relief package, dubbed the “American Rescue Plan,” also includes expanded federal unemployment benefits, direct payments to citizens and aid for schools and businesses.
Some of the city’s funding could be directed to the Longmont Housing Authority for more low-income housing vouchers, Dominguez said. Other funding could go to wastewater management.
“There are so many different pieces to this (funding),” Dominguez said.
Also, Dominiguez said he and other municipal and county officials are worried a massive weekend party near the University of Colorado Boulder will become a “super spreader” event for the virus and affect the county’s status on the state’s COVID dial.
As many as 800 people — few wearing masks — flooded the streets in University Hill neighborhoods on Saturday, vandalizing property and throwing rocks and bottles at police, according to the Associated Press. Few were wearing masks and health officials worried the melee could lead to a surge in COVID-19 cases and bring more restrictions on county businesses.
“We’re concerned it could lead to an increase in numbers that we see in Boulder County,” Dominguez said.
Boulder County is currently at Level Yellow on the state’s COVID dial, which limits most businesses to 50% of capacity.
If the weekend ruckus leads to an outbreak, the state could move the county to a more restrictive place on the COVID dial. A step back to Level Orange would mean most businesses would have to operate at 25% capacity.
“That’s what people are worried about,” Dominguez said.
He said he hopes the state will treat any prospective outbreak from the CU fracas as a local event, which won’t impact the county’s overall standing on the dial.
A county’s status on the dial is based on the seven-day total of new COVID cases, seven-day positivity percentage and whether hospitalizations are stable or declining.
Boulder County’s numbers as of Monday, which was the last time they were updated, were:
- 97.2 new cases per 100,000 residents in the past seven days;
- 2.6 % positivity; and
- nine days of declining or stable hospitalizations
The new case totals and positivity rate would place Boulder County a level down on the COVID dial, while the hospitalization rates are within the parameters for Level Yellow, according to Boulder County Public Health.
As of Wednesday, 19,395 county residents had tested or were considered probable for COVID, 599 were hospitalized and 248 had died with COVID, according to county data.
Boulder County COVID data
For information on Boulder County COVID cases, deaths, hospitalizations and trends, click here.
Statewide, there were 439,265 cases as of Wednesday, with 24,024 people hospitalized, according to the Colorado Department of Health and Environment. Deaths due to COVID totaled 6,049 and deaths among cases totaled 6,003.
