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County Commission Allocates
Commisioners
Fifth District Commissioner Anita Puckett then motioned to add $450,000 of funding towards memorial parks and playgrounds at all community center sites including at Johnsons Chapel, Belk, Keltonburg, Blue Springs, Snow Hill, Temperance Hall, and Midway. The motion failed with the lack of a second.
Commissioners
Commissioner Jerry Adcock then made a motion to amend Commissioner Matt Adcock’s motion, to have the commission vote on each one project separately. Commissioner Bruce Malone seconded, but it failed on a 10-4 vote.
Commissioners
Ultimately the commission voted 14-0 to allocate ARP funds to the projects listed for a total amount of $1,796,006. That leaves nearly $2.2 million of ARP Funding yet to be committed.

The DeKalb County Commission has decided where some of the county’s American Rescue Plan Act funding will be spent. Of the $3.98 million of ARP funding the county received, the commission has committed nearly $1.8 million to local projects. The county was authorized to spend $1.9 million of the funds, with the remainder to be allocated later this year. Funds must be spent or committed by December 31, 2024, and completely expended by the end of 2026.

During several special ARP meetings held by the commission, the workshop narrowed down some of the projects the funds will be spent on. In December 2021, the commission voted to allocate $750,000 of the funds to DTC Communication’s fiber infrastructure project. Then, at the County Commission meeting on Monday, February 28, the commission voted several more allocations.

DeKalb EMS was approved for $88,642 for four Lucas chest compression devices and $96,864 for three Zoll heart monitors.

The Smithville-DeKalb Rescue Squad will get funding for a $50,000 for an underwater camera, $7,000 for a raft, and $6,500 for an aerial drone, while $398,000 was approved as a grant match for construction of a new county $3.9 million county health department.

A last-minute addition to the funding was $26,000 for an outdoor kiosk for the DeKalb County Clerk’s Office, a project the County Clerk Jimmy Poss had requested late last year. The County Clerk’s office would pay the annual $5,000 maintenance fee on the kiosk.

The Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation (TDEC) is also providing $3,730,767 to be used strictly for water and sewer needs. The funds will be distributed on an 80/20 grant match basis per project. The county has allocated $373,000 of ARP money to fund 10 percent of local match with DeKalb County water utility applicants to fund the other 10 percent match.

At the County Commission meeting, Sixth District Commissioner Matt Adcock made a motion to allocate all of ARP funding for all the projects that were presented, with the addition of the County Clerk’s outdoor kiosk. Second District Commissioner Myron Rhody seconded the motion.

Fifth District Commissioner Jerry Adcock agreed with most of the allocations, but objected to the kiosk as a waste of money.

But others weighed the need for the kiosk. Fourth District Commissioner Janice Fish Stewart said the kiosk would be a convenience to people who work late hours and would otherwise find it hard to get to the County Clerk’s office during office hours.

Others questioned the placement of the kiosk outside the clerk’s office, as to rather being located in Liberty or Alexandria to make it more convenient for those residents.

County Clerk Poss then addressed the commission, explaining that the location outside his office would be more centrally located to all residents around the county.