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Overcast Community development funds earmarked for Long Beach
Nassau County officials announced that Long Beach will receive over half a million dollars in community development funds.
County Executive Edward Mangano and County Legislator Denise Ford (R-Long Beach) said on Tuesday that Long Beach would receive a total of $552,973 to help fund everything from “residential rehabilitation and park improvements to senior and youth programs, its food pantry to equipment for lifeguards.”
Community Development Block Grants are funds that are provided to the county by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The county then distributes them to municipalities as needed. Activities that benefit low to moderate-income community members are given first priority when it comes to CDBG funding. But individual municipalities may apply the funding to whichever community development programs they see as beneficial.
“The county will do everything it can to help the Long Beach recovery,” said Ford. “This is an excellent use of CDBG funds, and this money will go a long way to help community initiatives in our city.”
The funds are referred to as “pre-Sandy,” meaning that they were earmarked for the chosen programs before the storm. But, because the storm devastated the community, the funds will ultimately have some contribution to storm-related repairs and projects.
“While these dollars were earmarked Pre-Hurricane Sandy, the county will use them to help the City of Long Beach recover,” said Mangano. “Together with the city, we urge the federal government to approve New York State’s local recovery programs that result in significantly more funds being invested in recovery efforts.”
At the March 19 Long Beach City Council meeting, a number of organizations asked the city to be considered for community development money, including the Martin Luther King Center and Project Excellence.
“These are much needed funds for the city; it is just unfortunate that the federal allocation dwindles every year,” said City Manager Jack Schnirman. “However, we are still hopeful that we will receive additional critical community development funds for our recovery as part of the supplemental funding recently passed by Congress.”
