Montgomery County Recovery Office

The Draft Recovery Plan responds to the community’s prioritization for investment into more affordable housing options across the county, given the challenges to housing stability that the pandemic and related economic crises took on renters and homeowners. These investments include:

• Construction of 325 new affordable housing units for low and moderate income renters and homeowners 
• $5.5 million in seed funding for the Housing Opportunities Fund, an innovative public-private partnership to use unused land, blighted/condemned properties, and/or hotels for sale, for the use to build or rehab into affordable rental housing 
• $500,000 expansion of the down payment assistance program for first time homebuyers
• $5.8 million to support renovation of existing public and privately owned affordable units 
• $6.8 million for short-term housing for single adults experiencing homelessness, including costs associated with the relocation of the Coordinated Homeless Outreach Center which closed in July 2022

As a result of the pandemic’s significant and persistent impact on resident mental health, the Draft Recovery Plan supports programming into mental healthcare access across the county. These include:

• $5 million for school-based behavioral health services, which will enable school districts throughout Montgomery County to access funding to hire staff through a program coordinated by County Recovery and Mental Health Offices
• Community-based programs and services for child and adolescent art therapy, support services for rural older adults, and counseling services specific to LGBTQIA+ residents, among others
• $5 million for the creation of a behavioral health crisis response service center, allowing for a long-needed investment into the county’s ability to serve residents experiencing mental health crises

As part of its commitment to supporting an equitable recovery from the pandemic, the Recovery Office is recommending projects that will invest in historically underserved communities, providing facilities hosting critical services and gathering spaces. The Draft Recovery Plan includes investments such as:

• Support for a new site for ACLAMO Family Centers in Norristown, which primarily serves the Latino/Hispanic population
•  $7 million for the establishment and renovation of facilities serving the Norristown community
• $5.25 million is recommended for the creation of a community and wellness center specific to Asian, Asian American, and Pacific Islander communities
• $5.5 million is recommended to support the YWCA Tri-County’s new site expansion in Pottstown

The Pandemic Recovery Fund program prioritizes child care centers and the early childhood workforce, given the impact on the industry throughout the pandemic. The Draft Recovery Plan funds:

• $4 million in direct operational support for child care centers across the county made available through a program that will be coordinated by the County’s Recovery and Early Learning Resource Center offices 
• $3.3 million is allocated for the implementation of a novel in-home child care program supporting off-hours workers
• $500,000 for convening stakeholders in further research, strategic planning, and pilot programming to address the child care worker crisis, in response to a significant number of "idea" submissions that spoke to challenges in the industry related to worker retention and pay, ongoing education and training, and ability to attract qualified workers to the field

In response to its outreach specifically to small, minority and women-owned businesses, the Recovery Office received a number of submissions requesting support for business operations and other needs. The Draft Recovery Plan allocates:

• $2.7 million to fund small grants directly to improve women and minority-owned businesses, made immediately available to qualifying businesses that had already applied to the Pandemic Recovery Fund. Other qualifying businesses, with priority placed on the County’s qualified census tracts in Norristown and Pottstown would also be eligible to apply for this grant program. 
• $2.5 million across multiple projects to coordinate impactful investment in Norristown and Pottstown businesses
• $8.2 million for workforce development across multiple sectors, tuition assistance initiatives, and job marketing and preparedness mentoring projects

Project and idea submissions received through the Pandemic Recovery Fund process showed a prevalent community need for investment in all aspects of the County’s emergency food infrastructure, including food distribution, food production, policy and strategy, and coordination across all partners. The projects funded in the Draft Plan represent a commitment on the part of County and community partners to improve and construct a more cohesive and productive system incorporating focus on root causes. This includes:  

• $4 million allocated to construction and renovation of a food distribution warehouse
• $700,000 to increase coordination and improve logistics among food pantries in the county
• $1.1 million to establish a new food policy council in order to coordinate a comprehensive, county-wide plan addressing the root causes of food insecurity

Reflecting the intent of the ARPA legislation, the Draft Recovery Plan includes multiple initiatives focused on improving Montgomery County’s public health and public safety infrastructure. These investments include:

• Supporting emergency medical services workers training and pay
• Improving child and maternity health outcomes 
• Assisting firehouses experiencing pandemic-related financial losses
• Resources to analyze, study, and improve the overall emergency services system in the County
• Gun and domestic violence mitigation programs 
• COVID-19 monitoring and mitigation strategies
• Access to digital health enhancement efforts

The Draft Recovery Plan also recommends more than $39 million supporting initiatives in multiple program areas including:

• $34.2 million for government services and infrastructure, including revenue replacement, premium pay, essential worker retention and support, lead water piping replacement, and service improvement projects
• $5.1 million for non-profit and community support, including projects providing violence prevention, clothing distribution, immigrant case management services, community data resources and support for nonprofits impacted by the pandemic