What Funders Need to Know about ARPA

The American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) allocates coronavirus relief funding for a wide variety of economic and health priorities including childcare, public health, and homelessness prevention. These dollars are set to come through various funding streams, including some through jurisdictions, with the potential for some to flow to nonprofit organizations throughout Maryland. For example, The City of Baltimore’s Office of Recovery Programs is using an online application process for nonprofit organizations to propose uses for the ARPA funding. While understanding the dollar amounts potentially flowing across the state is significant, it is also important to look at the ways that nonprofit organizations set to receive this funding are being supported. What does this mean for the role of philanthropy? 

Join Maryland Philanthropy Network and our speakers for an overview of ARPA to contextualize the ways funds are being disbursed, including the $350 billion in State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds (SLFRF). Drawing on ideas found in this Philanthropy News Digest article by Darius Graham of the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Foundation, we’ll discuss how a greater understanding of priorities and processes in a community can help with allocating SLFRF in ways that inform grantmaking. We will conclude with a dynamic panel discussion with our partners on how funders can support nonprofits, provide community input about public dollars, and address any potential funding gaps.

Our speakers include: 

• Neil Bergsman, Senior Policy Analyst, Maryland Nonprofits 
• Darius Graham, Program Director, Weinberg Foundation
• Heather Iliff, President & CEO, Maryland Nonprofits
• Shamiah T. Kerney, Chief Recovery Officer, Baltimore Mayor’s Office of Recovery Programs 

This briefing is for Maryland Philanthropy Network members only.