Fed Sends County $126 Million

Polk County has been given 126 million dollars from the federal government. It literally was wired into our account with no prior notice. This happened last week.

We have been trying to determine what strings are attached. There are some but not nearly as many as FEMA Hurricane clean up money.

Bottom line, this money will not be used for roads or sidewalks or paying other bills. We agreed it will be used to help the citizens adversely affected by our economy collapsing over the last few weeks.

We will get it figured out but I want to see it used for direct payments for bills such as electric bills and rent/mortgage payments. We will need to help our small businesses, my thought is 2-25 employees.

This money will not "fix" our local economy but it will give some a little breathing room. I instructed our county manager to have a plan outline put together for our next meeting.

We will move fast on this. There are people facing problems they couldn't even imagine 90 days ago. We will do our best to get this money to those in need as quick as possible.

(Editor's note: Bill Braswell is chairman of the Polk Board of County Commissioners. This story has been edited for purposes of clarity and timeliness.)