Isothermal RPO Director Recognized
The Isothermal Rural Planning Organization (Region C's Transportation Planning Arm for Polk, Rutherford, and McDowell County's) Director Karyl Fuller was recognized for her contributions to the State Transportation Planning Process known as SPOT 5.0. See the story here:
https://isothermalrpo.org/2017/07/12/isothermal-rpo-director-receives-ncdots-road-gang-award/
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Aging Services here in Region C
This is the last in our FY 17-18 Budget Review. This one concerns itself with Aging Services. The Director of Aging Services is Laura Lynch, who has served in her role as Director of Aging Services since 2002.
Older Americans Act - Title III, Title V, Family Caregiver, & Ombudsman Programs
The Commission serves as the Area Agency on Aging (AAA) in the four-county region. The AAA serves to facilitate and support the development of programs to address the needs of older adults. The AAA provides advocacy, planning, program and resource development, information brokerage, funds administration, and quality assurance for the various programs. The Agency focuses on supporting and assisting older adults in obtaining services offered in their communities through local aging service providers. These include social services such as in-home assistance, legal assistance, senior centers, and the nutrition programs—both congregate and home-delivered.
The Area Agency is responsible for planning and service delivery through the following major programs:
The Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program is an advocacy program which promotes and protects the rights of residents in long-term care facilities as established by the Older Americans Act. The Ombudsman is responsible for investigating and resolving complaints made by or on behalf of residents. For additional information please contact Mandy Johnson (Cleveland, McDowell and Rutherford Cos.) at 828-351-2328 or Lori Simpson (Polk Co.) at 828-351-2326
The Family Caregiver Support Program has the responsibility to plan, provide, and coordinate multi-faceted systems of supportive services for family caregivers. The program offers information about services, assistance with accessing these services, counseling, support groups, caregiver education, and respite for caregivers, and services to supplement in-home care. For additional information please contact Danielle Williams at 828-351-2370
The Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP or Title V) seeks to place people aged 55 or older, who are economically disadvantaged, into useful part-time community service positions to gain skills and work experience to enable them to achieve non-subsidized employment. This program is federally funded under Title V of the Older Americans Act. For additional information please contact: Lori Simpson at 828-351-2326
This is the 26th year that most Title III funds will be allocated as a part of the Home and Community Care Block Grant, approved by the General Assembly in 1991. The total amount allocated to the Commission in the HCCBG is $1,799,016. The proposed budget includes State funds for planning, administration, and program development, elder abuse and several smaller activities. The total estimated budget amount for all Aging Programs (including HCCBG) is $2,941,175.
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NADO Alert: House Appropriations Subcommittee Takes Action on Transportation and Housing and Urban Development FY2018 Funding
On Monday evening, the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation and Housing and Urban Development and Related Agencies (THUD) released its spending bill for fiscal year (FY) 2018. The bill provides funding for transportation investments and housing and community development programs including the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program. The House THUD Appropriations Subcommittee will be meeting this evening to mark up the bill.
In total, the bill contains $56.5 billion in discretionary spending which is $1.1 billion below the FY2017 spending level and $8.6 billion above the President’s request.
Recommended Funding for U.S. Department of Transportation
The House THUD Appropriations Subcommittee recommends $17.8 billion in discretionary DOT spending for FY2018, a reduction of $646 million below the FY2017 level and $1.1 billion above the President’s request.
Highways: For highway programs, the bill provides $45 billion towards the Highway Trust Fund, $968 million above the FY2017 spending level. This amount mirrors the level authorized by the FAST Act.
Transit: The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) is set to be funded at $11.75 billion, $662 million over the FY2017 spending level and $526 million above the President’s request. Language in the bill reduces the federal match of New Starts projects to 50%.
TIGER: The bill calls for the elimination of the National Infrastructure Investment grants also known as TIGER which is recommended in the President’s request. The program was funded at $500 million in FY2017.
Recommended Funding for the Department of Housing and Urban Development
The bill provides $38.3 billion for the Department of Housing and Urban Development, $487 million below the FY2017 spending level and $6.9 billion above the President’s request.
Community Development Block Grants: For CDBG, the bill includes $2.9 billion which is $100 million less than the FY2017 level. The President’s budget proposal requested the elimination of the program.
HOME Investment Partnerships Program: The bill includes $850 million for the HOME program, $100 million less than the FY2017 level. The President’s budget proposal requested the elimination of the program.
Public and Native American Housing: The bill sets funding for Section 8 and Native American Housing programs at $27.5 billion, $16 million under the FY2017 level.
Community Planning and Development: The bill provides $6.6 billion for Community Planning and Development programs which is $209 million below the FY2017 level.
ACTION NEEDED:
Once passed by the subcommittee, the THUD Appropriations bill will be considered by the full House Appropriations Committee. Please contact your House or Senate Appropriations Committee member (click here to view a list), and ask them to support level funding for CDBG and HOME in the FY2018 appropriations process.
The IPDC Board of Directors passed a resolution in support of level funding for programs such as CDBG that benefit our membership. As a result of that, we have written letters to our delegation regarding our desire for level funding of CDBG dollars. These letters can be found at this link: https://regioncorg.files.wordpress.com/2017/03/the-honorable-mark-meadows.pdf and https://regioncorg.files.wordpress.com/2017/03/the-honorable-patrick-mchenry.pdf
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Cleveland County MPO Input Sought
In Region C, we are divided into an RPO (Rural Planning Organization) and an MPO (Metropolitan Planning Organization) with Polk, Rutherford, and McDowell being an RPO and Cleveland as part of the Gaston-Cleveland-Lincoln MPO. The IPDC staff the RPO while the MPO is staffed out of the City of Gastonia. The purpose of our weekly newsletter is to serve all of our membership, so we feel the need to highlight as many issues as we can and to also inform our membership of what is happening around the Region. So, here is the latest news out of the Cleveland County part of our region regarding Transportation issues: http://gclmpo.org/how-to-get-involved/public-involvement/
Contact for the Gaston-Cleveland-Lincoln MPO is:
Randi P. Gates, AICP
Senior Transportation Planner
Gaston-Cleveland-Lincoln MPO
150 South York Street
PO Box 1748
Gastonia, NC 28053
Office: 704-854-6604
Mobile: 980-925-7405
randig@cityofgastonia.com
www.gclmpo.org
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