Committee approves reallocated ERA funds; awards disbursement to Community Advocates

The Community and Economic Development Committee approved a substitute resolution on the allocation of reallocated Emergency Rental Assistance (ERA) funds from the U.S. Department of the Treasury, authorizing the city to assign the funds to Community Advocates for direct rental- and utility-arrears assistance.

The resolution, introduced as file number 241372, was moved by Alderman Jose Perez and ordered adopted on a voice vote with no objection. City staff and Community Advocates described the allocation as a combination of two allotments discussed in the meeting: an eligible $3,600,000 reallocation and an additional $5,400,000 made available under ERA 2, yielding new funding the committee asked be assigned to Community Advocates for emergency rental assistance work.

Committee members pressed staff and Community Advocates on program details. Mario Higgins, Community Development Grants Administration, said the funds will be used to help residents with rent arrears, utility arrears and other pandemic-period back payments and that the city must expend these reallocated ERA funds by September 2025. Higgins said the city previously received roughly $27,000,000 in earlier disbursements for rental assistance during the pandemic and explained that ERA 2 funds were reallocated by Treasury from jurisdictions that did not spend their awards.

Andy Elliott, chief executive officer of Community Advocates, and Maduella Kirkenau, chief operating officer, told the committee the agency will administer the funds and expects to serve a large number of households. In the meeting Community Advocates stated two different household estimates when asked: first that they anticipated serving “about 30 500 households” and later confirming “35,100 households” (as spoken at the meeting). Community Advocates said they intend to operate on a first-come, first-served basis and to coordinate with partners including the Rental Housing Resource Center, Legal Aid Society and Mediate Wisconsin for intake and eviction-prevention referrals. The agency also said it will scale staff and expects to hire additional caseworkers to manage the effort.

Committee members raised questions about how much of the funds could be paid directly to utilities and landlords versus how many households would be helped, and whether the city could engage utility companies about arrearage negotiation. Community Advocates said some payments would go to utilities when eligible and that they already negotiate down required down payments with utility providers and administer energy assistance programs countywide.

Alderman Marina Dimitrievich, Alderman Deandre Jackson and others urged robust outreach and asked staff to share promotional materials with committee members; staff agreed to circulate flyers and web/social links after council action. The committee also discussed monitoring and oversight; staff said they will track expenditures closely given the September 2025 spending deadline and that the city will coordinate reporting with the grantee.

The formal action recorded in the meeting: Alderman Jose Perez moved adoption of the substitute resolution; hearing no objection, the chair ordered it adopted and directed staff to proceed with allocating the ERA funds to Community Advocates for administration.