https://www.americancityandcounty.com/wp-content/themes/acc_child/assets/images/logo/footer-logo.png
  • Home
  • Co-op Solutions
  • Hybrid Work
  • Commentaries
  • News
  • In-Depth
  • Multimedia
    • Back
    • Podcast
  • Resources & Events
    • Back
    • Resources
    • Webinars
    • White Papers
    • IWCE 2022
    • How to Contribute
    • Municipal Cost Index – Archive
    • Equipment Watch Page
    • American City & County Awards
  • About Us
    • Back
    • About Us
    • Contact Us
    • Advertise
    • Privacy Statement
    • Terms of Service
American City and County
  • NEWSLETTER
  • Home
  • Co-op Solutions
  • Hybrid Work
  • Commentaries
  • News
  • In-Depth
  • Multimedia
    • Back
    • Podcasts
  • Resources/Events
    • Back
    • Webinars
    • White Papers/eBooks
    • IWCE 2022
    • How to Contribute
    • American City & County Awards
    • Municipal Cost Index
    • Equipment Watch Page
  • About Us
    • Back
    • About Us
    • Contact Us
    • Advertise
    • Cookie Policy
    • Privacy Stament
    • Terms of Service
  • newsletter
  • Administration
  • Economy & Finance
  • Procurement
  • Public Safety
  • Public Works & Utilities
  • Smart Cities & Technology
  • Magazine
acc.com

Hybrid Work


Work is not where you go. It’s what you do. In today’s hybrid work world, it is no longer enough to solve for the challenges of remote work or support a safe office re-entry. It’s about finding solutions to not just recover in the face of change, but to thrive and innovate. Empower your workers at home, in the office, or anywhere.

Image via Unsplash

Article

Are you letting your CARES Act funding go to waste?

Are you letting your CARES Act funding go to waste?

  • Written by James Ha, Corry Flatt
  • 11th November 2020

To any grant or public procurement professional in local government, Dec. 30 may seem like an impossible sprint to the finish line. According to the Office of Management and Budget’s Uniform Grant Guidance, any governments receiving CARES Act funding, specifically those under the Coronavirus Relief Fund (CRF), must ensure those are incurred before that day.

While the Department of Treasury and other federal entities have tried to provide as much guidance as possible, there are still many gray areas intended to give local governments the flexibility to spend funds on their most urgent needs. The downside to these gray areas? They can lead to much fear and confusion–even contributing to decision paralysis. This is especially true when organizations are doing their utmost to avoid audit findings and having to pay back the federal government.

While the urge to avoid risk at all costs is understandable, local governments may be diminishing the impact of their CRF dollars by not using them to the fullest. There are two key reasons as to why governments at the city and county level may be under-utilizing critical funding that’s available to them: difficulty managing performance of funding and the urge to discount technologies as discretionary costs when they can actually be fundamental to business continuity.


Trouble managing performance of funding

For city and county governments acting as grantors of COVID-19 relief, navigating different funding streams and tracking their own compliance and administration requirements can be especially challenging. Not to mention they must manage recipients of funding and ensure their success or risk paying back the federal government from their own pockets.

For the city of Atlanta, these challenges were compounded by cross-departmental efforts to manage grantees, including vendor contracts and different payments to manage. The city also had to navigate reviewing and scoring applications remotely with the onset of mass telework.

To reduce administration time and streamline compliance, Atlanta turned to cloud-based grants management software. As a result, the city was able to expedite processes that would have previously taken 6 to 8 months down to mere weeks. Additionally, Atlanta was able to grow revenue by increasing the number of qualified grant proposals by 44 percent over the previous year.


Cutting mission-critical technologies out of the budget

In the wake of states experiencing nearly $650 billion in revenue shortfall over the next three years, it’s no surprise that governments are doing everything they can to cut costs. Too often, however, some of the first things to be eliminated from budgets are technologies considered as “discretionary costs.” Given the new realities of mass telework and virtual collaboration across all workforces, it’s clear that the right technologies can actually be essential, especially those that digitize mission-critical processes like grants and procurement–so governments can get services faster to those who need them the most.

In fact, investing in digitization now can save significant time and costs in the long-term. In a recent report on the State of Public Sourcing, 73 percent of public agencies indicated they are prioritizing digital procurement processes to ensure business continuity and streamline manual and operational tasks. By digitizing core procurement processes, public procurement agencies have seen at least $225,000 in cost savings–due to increased vendor competition, faster project cycle times, and access to peer data and insights that facilitate more strategic procurement decision making.

Governments that are making the most of their CRF funding

Digital transformation can, in fact, serve as a force multiplier, driving greater impact even with limited funding and staff. Additionally, the modern grant and procurement software solutions come with built-in compliance with Uniform Grant Guidance as well as Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR), reducing the risk of audit findings.

For example, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) in San Francisco knew their existing hard-copy and paper-based scoring processes were holding them back. By digitizing their entire sourcing process, MTC was able to cut procurement project times as much as 67 percent by allowing their teams to run complex RFPs in a month versus the typical 60 to 90 days. Plus, MTC saw 200 percent faster project cycles compared to old processes.

The California Department for Housing and Community Development (HCD) used a digital grant management solution to integrate its state financial system as well as HUD’s federal reporting system to help streamline the distribution and tracking of funding. Now, HCD is managing over 7 programs and 100 subawards as well as disbursing over $3.5 billion in Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) and CDBG-DR (Disaster Recovery) funding across the state. Centralizing the tracking and distribution of grant funding means local government recipients will receive their relief in a timelier manner.

Ultimately, local governments should resist the urge to divert funding elsewhere when it comes to moving grants administration and procurement to the cloud. By digitizing these essential processes, they can amplify impact and deliver critical services to communities faster than ever before while enabling long-term fiscal health.

 

James Ha is President and CEO of eCivis. Corry Flatt is the founder and CEO of Bonfire.

Tags: Administration Economy Hybrid Work Administration Economy Economy & Finance Article

Most Recent


  • American City & County survey highlights civic engagement priorities in public sector
    In today’s frenetic social media-driven environment, engaging with constituents can be a balancing act—too much interaction and they might tune you out or unsubscribe; too little civic engagement might cause them to disengage with messaging. A survey conducted by American City & County (AC&C) quantifies in data the ways communities are walking this delicate line—leveraging […]
  • Changing recruitment practices can ease retention challenges
    Ahead of the historic investment in American infrastructure, government organizations are facing an unprecedented employment and retention squeeze. But while there’s a lot of economic drivers that are out of administrators’ control, there are certain hiring practices that can soften the blow.  “We’re already constrained in finding the talent we need,” said Elizabeth Kellar, director […]
  • With the digital evolution, equity in accessibility is of utmost importance
    When historians write the history books of tomorrow, they’ll note a sharp divide in the timeline: Pre-pandemic and what came after. This chasm spans industry and locality, impacting just about every aspect of society, such as the way governments interact with constituents in the digital realm. Before stay-at-home orders and mask mandates were issued, residents […]
  • Amid shifting workplace expectations, local government employers must adapt
    Constrained by inflexible budgets, local government employers can’t compete with the lucrative salaries offered in the private sector. And while recruitment has always been a challenge for public employers, the last two years have been especially difficult. From January 2020 to the same month this year, government organizations lost around 600,000 jobs—more than manufacturing, wholesale […]

Leave a comment Cancel reply

-or-

Log in with your American City and County account

Alternatively, post a comment by completing the form below:

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related Content

  • Lessons from your friendly neighborhood public service employees
  • Harris County deploys next-generation security in 150 public buildings
  • How local governments can get ahead of the infrastructure wave: Strategies to mitigate risk
  • Prioritizing rapid restore leads to stronger ransomware attack recovery

Twitter


AmerCityCounty

Remote alarm notifications add firewall as utilities face mounting threats of cyberattacks dlvr.it/SRB2fd

27th May 2022
AmerCityCounty

10 of America’s most idyllic lakeside communities dlvr.it/SR9yVd

27th May 2022
AmerCityCounty

Infrastructure improvements in cities often feature clean energy or connected technologies dlvr.it/SR6vm8

26th May 2022
AmerCityCounty

Ahead of Surfside condo collapse anniversary, Florida’s legislature approves statewide inspection standards dlvr.it/SR6qL7

26th May 2022
AmerCityCounty

American City & County survey highlights civic engagement priorities in public sector dlvr.it/SR3hMS

25th May 2022
AmerCityCounty

Changing recruitment practices can ease retention challenges dlvr.it/SQzzPt

24th May 2022
AmerCityCounty

EVs are coming in a big way – Will charging infrastructure be ready? dlvr.it/SQzfL1

24th May 2022
AmerCityCounty

Optimizing the 3 stages of RFP creation for faster results | June 16, 2022 at 2 PM ET dlvr.it/SQzV7d

24th May 2022

Newsletters

Sign up for American City & County’s newsletters to receive regular news and information updates about local governments.

Resale Insights Dashboard

The Resale Insights Dashboard provides model-level data for the entire used equipment market to help you save time and money.

Municipal Cost Index

Updated monthly since 1978, our exclusive Municipal Cost Index shows the effects of inflation on the cost of providing municipal services

Media Kit and Advertising

Want to reach our digital audience? Learn more here.

DISCOVER MORE FROM INFORMA TECH

  • IWCE’s Urgent Communications
  • IWCE Expo

WORKING WITH US

  • About Us
  • Contact Us

FOLLOW American City and County ON SOCIAL

  • Privacy
  • CCPA: “Do Not Sell My Data”
  • Cookies Policy
  • Terms
Copyright © 2022 Informa PLC. Informa PLC is registered in England and Wales with company number 8860726 whose registered and Head office is 5 Howick Place, London, SW1P 1WG.
This website uses cookies, including third party ones, to allow for analysis of how people use our website in order to improve your experience and our services. By continuing to use our website, you agree to the use of such cookies. Click here for more information on our Cookie Policy and Privacy Policy.
X