McHenry County planning and community development staff presented a new Community Investment Plan (CIP) on Oct. 30 designed to catalog municipal CDBG/HOME-eligible projects within low/moderate-income (LMI) census tracts and to proactively engage municipalities in the annual funding cycle.

Derek and Adam (planning and community development staff) said they worked with county GIS to produce LMI maps by census tract and asked municipalities to submit project request forms aligned to HUD eligibility criteria. Staff said they visited 14–15 of 28 municipalities in person to encourage participation.

As a result of the outreach, eight municipalities returned project request forms this year with 44 total projects amounting to more than $58 million in requested work. Staff said the projects break down primarily to public infrastructure (24 projects) and public facilities (16 projects), plus a small number of economic development, housing redevelopment and workforce development proposals.

Staff noted that lead-service-line inventories and replacement obligations—driven by state and federal requirements—are a growing municipal need and that replacement costs can be substantial. One member observed that an individual lead-service replacement could be roughly $15,000 and stressed that municipalities and residents may lack funding to comply with any mandated replacement schedule.

Planning staff said the CIP is a year-one tool meant to be updated annually: municipalities and townships will be asked to refresh project lists ahead of the NOFO/application cycle so the county can reach out proactively to eligible local projects. The intent is to have a pre-screened list of eligible projects that can be encouraged to apply for CDBG or HOME funding, and to use the CIP to support county-level advocacy to HUD and legislators for additional resources.

Staff provided initial estimates of entitlement funding cited in the meeting: roughly $3.017 million (CDBG) and about $600,000 (HOME) in the countys current allocations, and noted early letters-of-intent show higher demand (staff reported roughly $5.2 million in CDBG requests and about $2 million in HOME requests already received in preliminary project briefs). Representatives emphasized that HUD entitlement formulas and federal funding totals have been relatively flat and recommended focusing on fully funding impactful projects rather than distributing small amounts across many projects.

Ending note: Staff said the CIP will be made available to decision-makers and municipalities and will be updated each funding cycle to improve municipal engagement and to better represent county needs to HUD.