Rebuilding Public Sector Capacity Through ARPA

At the national level, The United States Congress and The White House have both encouraged local governments to use their ARPA funds to rebuild the municipal workforce. Through December 2023, local governments across the country have invested nearly $1.25 billion of ARPA funding in the municipal workforce. Many have focused their efforts on shorter-term hiring solutions and/or one-time bonus pay incentives. 

For a gateway city like Lowell, however, we must take a longer-term view to creating sustainable talent pipelines for our public service roles. We believe that local government needs to invest more in general public-sector workforce development and training, as well as youth and young professional public-sector workforce development programs, to defend against leadership loss and improve overall service delivery. 

Through the application of ARPA funding, the City of Lowell will be investing in its current employee base, as well as rebuilding critical staffing vacancies, to improve the delivery of essential services to the residents of the city to accomplish this, Lowell is investing in a multi-year, and multi-faceted approach to addressing these challenges head on.  Below is a list of the steps taken this far, and the costs associated with each effort. 

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City Employee Wage Adjustment Program 

These short-term investments are crucial to getting local government service delivery back on track. However, gateway cities like Lowell must think longer-term about how we can create sustainable talent pipelines into public service roles. Local governments need to invest more in general public sector workforce development and training, and youth and young professional public sector workforce development programs to combat leadership loss and improve service delivery. This wage adjustment is only one component of the city’s multi-year plan to rebuild the public sector workforce and improve service delivery to the residents and businesses of Lowell. 

At the national level, the Congress and the White House have both encouraged local governments to use their ARPA funds to rebuild their municipal workforces. Of the nearly $8.68 billion in total ARPA funds already designated for use across the country, local governments have invested nearly $1.25 billion (approximately 15%) in municipal workforces. Most of that money, however, has been designated for shorter-term hiring and pay bonuses. 

 

MIS Team Expansion Salaries & Benefits 

The MIS Team is utilizing the Rebuilding Public Sector Capacity component of ARPA to hire a systems administrator to manage the City of Lowell's computer network and server applications.  Prior to the 2009 City-wide layoffs, MIS had two Systems Administrators on staff, losing one as a result of the layoffs. Unfortunately, technology demands throughout the City since 2009 have only increased year-over-year. Adding a Systems Administrator back onto the MIS staff would make a significant impact on our ability to deliver on our mission to use technology as a tool for the delivery of better government services.   

Per Treasury guidelines, recipients are permitted to use SLFRF funds to hire above the pre-pandemic baseline, provided a calculation to determine the adjustment for historical growth is performed. The City of Lowell performed this calculation and determined that the city could rehire as many as 91 total positions under this provision.   


Elections Office Staff Rebuilding   

The Elections Office has been understaffed for decades. By hiring additional staff, the Elections Office will be better able to comply with state mandated election programming efforts. Some of these state mandated activities include; conducting a second census, updating voter roles based on eligibility, and better staffing ratios at polling locations during an election cycle. 

Per Treasury guidelines, recipients are permitted to use SLFRF funds to hire above the pre-pandemic baseline, provided a calculation to determine the adjustment for historical growth is performed. The City of Lowell performed this calculation and determined that the city could rehire as many as 91 total positions under this provision. 


City Employee Leadership & Retention Training Program 

As part of the rebuilding public sector capacity efforts within the City of Lowell, the City Manager is implementing several management and staff development/ training courses. These classes will cover various topics including; improving communication between managers and staff, learning how to set, track, and manage both long-term and short-term goals, setting expectations, and learning how to delegate more effectively. 

As a result of the pandemic, many department heads throughout the city have “turned over”. City leaders have placed an emphasis on enhancing leadership the current workforce as well as implement meaningful succession planning. Knowing there is a growing workforce shortage in municipal government, we plan to enhance our current leaders' skills to help grow themselves as individuals as well as an organization as a whole. 


Emergency Management Staff Salaries & Benefits   

As the City of Lowell's population increases, so too has the need for improved emergency preparedness. The new Deputy Director will work with the current Director of Emergency Management (also the Fire Chief) to improve emergency action planning as well as the coordination of emergency response services at a local, state and national level. 

Per Treasury guidelines, recipients are permitted to use SLFRF funds to hire above the pre-pandemic baseline, provided a calculation to determine the adjustment for historical growth is performed. The City of Lowell performed this calculation and determined that the city could rehire as many as 91 total positions under this provision.