SOUTHSIDE COMMUNITY CENTER
The Hays County Commissioners Court approved $125,000 of funding for the Southside Community Center on Tuesday, with $100,000 coming from the Hays County tobacco settlement fund and $25,000 coming from an American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) grant.
An additional amount of $25,000 represents the annual amount set aside for the Community Center every year since 2020 during the budgeting process.
The funding measure was co-sponsored by Debbie Ingalsbe, Commissioner for Pct. 1, which includes San Marcos, and Kandice Boutté, who serves as the County Administrator for Hays County.
“I believe this program will help support individuals and families in maintaining stable and safe housing during difficult times,” Ingalsbe said. “It also provides assistance and connects people with resources helping prevent homelessness, which creates a healthier and more stable community.”
Ingalsby said Southside has increased the level of services in the past year, leading to the measure proposing increased funding. “Southside is really ramping up.”
Although the Court unanimously approved the funds for the Community Center, Commissioners Walt Smith, Pct. 4, and Morgan Hammer, Pct. 3, stressed the need for accurate budgeting and increased oversight in the application process for funding, which they would prefer to happen during the budgeting process rather than as one-time grant.
“I just want to make sure that these organizations coming in do have a plan,” Hammer said. “Do you have funding coming in from various other sources? I would have loved to have this conversation during our budget, and then we would have been in a different place than we are now, trying to scramble for funds.”
“I want to make sure that there is direct accountability,” Smith said. “And we have access to every bit of that data, and we have the ability to make a decision before our budget process,” Smith said.
Commissioner Michelle Cohen, Pct. 2, said Hays County has tried to create a system to accurately measure the benefit which a social service organization provides relative to the donation they receive from the Court.
“We’re trying to build up the social service program, make it available for everyone, actually show how it contributes to the overall goals of our County, to our strategic plan, Cohen said. “We do not have this at the moment, but it will come.”
Ingalsby noted that the court has previously approved funding for social agencies outside of the budgeting process, and the funding would set the Community Center on a course to submit future funding requests during the regular budgeting cycle.
“The budget process is the appropriate place to go, Ingalsby said. “But at times, we are facing these issues, and we have to address them, and so I was just prepared to do that.
Southside board president Todd Salmi said he viewed the funding approved on Tuesday as “bridge funding” to meet the immediate needs of the Community Center and to get in sync with fiscal year budget requests.
Salmi also noted the Community Center does not rely on the Commissioner’s Court for the majority of its funding. He said the annual operation budget at the Community Center is $1 million, with a $250,000 grant from the McCoy Foundation as the largest single funding source. And he stressed the Community Center’s efforts to create a transparent breakdown of funding sources.”
Salmi also discussed the ongoing fundraising efforts at Southside, including the Southside Spring Fair at the Community Center this weekend.
AMERICAN RESCUE PLAN ACT
ARPA was signed into law by President Biden in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic, and included $350 billion for states, cities, counties, territories, and tribal governments.
THE HAYS COUNTY TOBACCO FUND
Under the terms of a settlement negotiated in the summer of 1998, tobacco companies agreed to create a $2.275 billion fund for the benefit of “all hospital districts, other local political subdivisions owning and maintaining public hospitals, and counties of the State of Texas responsible for providing indigent care to the general public.”
At the outset, $450 million of the nearly $2.3 billion was deposited into a “lump sum trust account” and distributed to local entities over a three-year period. The remainder, approximately $1.8 billion, was deposited into a “permanent trust account” with local entities receiving yearly disbursements each spring from investment earnings, according to County Progress, the official publication of the County Judges and Commissioners Association of Texas, County Progress.
