Recovery Act - Bringing help to St. Petersburg

The Recovery Act, also known as the Stimulus, includes dozens of opportunities for St. Petersburg to help buffer the impact of the recession. I have spent many hours researching how we can hire police officers, repair our water treatment plants, make our city buildings more energy efficient, bring job training services and help with foreclosed properties. At each council meeting for several weeks, I advocated that we full engage in the effort to help our community deal with rising unemployment.

Happily, the administration agreed and I was named as the Council's person on the stimulus team. I will continue to look for opportunities for our community. Some funds are competitive and require us to send in grant requests. Others will go to our community through other agencies. Since the money will be spent somewhere, I will do all that I can to be sure that help comes here.

The City's new recovery website is: www.stpeterecovery.org It has the status on available funds.