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Billions in federal COVID relief distributed by NC Senate budget. Here’s where it would go.

The American Rescue Plan Act sends billions of dollars in coronavirus relief to North Carolina. The proposed Senate budget spends $5.4 billion of it.

The relief bill was passed by Congress and signed into law by President Joe Biden. The entire U.S. Senate and House Republican delegations voted against the bill in Congress, a vote that fell along party lines.

A huge chunk of state Senate Republicans’ budget proposal to spend the money would go toward business relief — $1 billion for the JOBS Grant program, which was part of the Senate GOP’s tax plan, and $500 million for the Small Business Pandemic Recovery Grant program.

JOBS Grants are $18,750 grants given automatically to businesses that were already recipients of the COVID-19 Job Retention Program, Economic Injury Disaster Loan Advance, Paycheck Protection Program, Restaurant Revitalization Fund or Shuttered Venue Operators Grant Program.

Here are other areas where money would go if the allocations in the Senate budget become law:

$330 million for high speed internet GREAT grants.

$545 million for bonuses for essential workers among government employees.

$550 million for State Drinking Water/Wastewater Infrastructure Grants

$40 million for State Parks water and sewer projects.

$100 million in local assistance for stormwater infrastructure investments.

$7 million to the Carolina Small Business Development Fund.

$12.8 million in federal funds for the N.C. State Fair.

$5.7 million for North Carolina Aquariums. The state’s three aquariums are at Fort Fisher, Roanoke Island and Pine Knoll Shores.

$1.9 million for the North Carolina Zoo.

Money for the zoo, aquariums and State Fair are all to recoup losses from the COVID-19 pandemic, not new projects. The fair, Fort Fisher aquarium and the zoo, however, do get project funding elsewhere in the budget with state money.

$15 million for broadband internet access for rural community colleges.

$150 million for lead and asbestos remediation in schools and child care centers.

$5 million in grants to volunteer fire departments.

$1 million for the North Carolina Symphony.

$500,000 to the Tyrell County 4-H Program.

$500,000 to the Natural Science Center of Greensboro.

According to the legislature’s Fiscal Research Division’s breakdown of federal spending in the budget, after the $4.8 billion is spent in fiscal year 2021-22, there is another $583 million remaining to spend. The budget, which is a two-year spending plan, allocates $300 million the following year for the Department of Transportation Reserve. That leaves $283 million left to allocate from the federal government for coronavirus relief under the American Rescue Plan.

For more North Carolina government and politics news, listen to the Under the Dome politics podcast from The News & Observer and the NC Insider. You can find it at link.chtbl.com/underthedomenc or wherever you get your podcasts.