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The City’s ARPA investments fall into three overarching categories:
1. Revenue Replacement
The COVID-19 pandemic dramatically reduced the City’s revenues making it necessary to appropriate much of the initial funding to replacing revenue and restoring services. This revenue replacement allowed the City to avoid additional budget cuts, restore furloughs, and ensure a balanced budget for Fiscal Year (FY) 2021 through FY2024.
2. Public Safety
The Administration recognizes that maintaining public safety is critical to the overall well-being of the New Orleans community and has allocated the largest investment of ARPA funds towards this goal. The funding will support increased staffing levels through active recruitment and retention efforts, as well as upgraded public safety facilities and equipment, enabling first responders to carry out their duties effectively and efficiently. These initiatives will be complemented by several others in areas such as public health, youth services, and technology.
3. Economic Response
The Administration will use ARPA funds to invest in projects, initiatives, and projects that will generate recurring revenue, increase wealth, and provide opportunities within local communities. Targeted investment in the most historically underserved neighborhoods will work to ensure equitable development across the city. Funneling public funds toward projects that benefit New Orleans economically from the bottom up will help secure a prosperous future for all New Orleanians.
4. Infrastructure
ARPA funds will supplement several existing infrastructure investments by committing resources to key projects. New Orleans understood the meaning of resilience long before the COVID-19 pandemic and these projects will ensure that New Orleans is able to return to pre-pandemic levels of quality-of-life and can also weather any future storm to come.
5. Public Health
The Administration will funnel resources to address the widest service disparities among vulnerable populations. This investment will seek to address public health needs holistically to reduce the intersectional impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on communities.
6. Administration
The City has reserved a small amount of funding for critical staffing and resources needed to execute its $194 million investment in priority projects. This funding will allow the City to efficiently implement initiatives without having to redirect existing resources away from day to day operations and critical services.