ST. MARTINVILLE — Usually, one of the worst things you can imagine happening in a public meeting is a lawyer standing up with the remote for a PowerPoint presentation.

But Tuesday night’s overview of proposed American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) projects from St. Martin Parish President Chester Cedars left almost everyone in the auditorium with a smile by the time he finished.

The $1.9 trillion ARPA legislation provides money to municipalities to cover COVID expenditures and to provide economic relief due to the impacts of the pandemic. Most administrations, however, have been reluctant to go after the funds because of the myriad constraints on how they can be used.

Cedars, however, asked the parish council to approve hiring a consultant to dig through the technicalities of the legislation, an expense that the ARPA funds can be used to reimburse. Consequently, the administration has identified several projects which are directly covered through the ARPA guidelines — and at least one creative way to use ARPA funds to free up money for a renovation of the parish government office complex.

“We can make investments in water, sewer and broadband,” Cedars said. “Not retention ponds, not to offset tax fund balances. Almost all of the uses must have a causal relationship to the COVID-19 pandemic effects except for investments in water, sewer and broadband, and also healthcare investments.”

One project that has been on the drawing board since before the pandemic is a consolidation of water systems in the parish to take advantage of the industrial water plant at the Martin Mills site. Under ARPA, infrastructure projects for broadband expansion, water and wastewater projects are allowed uses regardless of whether or not there is a COVID-19 tie-in.

The plan as presented Tuesday also calls for spending $3.8 million to expand water infrastructure in the northern portion of St. Martin Parish, specifically along portions of Highway 94 and in Water Works District 5. Another $3 million is earmarked for expanding broadband service to underserved portions of the parish.

Initially, Cedars said that he did not think the parish could take advantage of the legislation’s reimbursement of losses from revenue declines during the pandemic, but after working with consultants the parish could be eligible to use up to $2 million of the $10.3 million to reimburse its general fund.

That reimbursement is where the parish would get to be creative in its use of that money. The ARPA guidelines allow funds to be used for health care infrastructure, so he proposed using ARPA money to complete renovations on the technology building at the St. Luke Hospital site, which would free up the $884,000 still being held in the defunct hospital district account.

“We could replace the money in that find with the ARPA funds, then use the other money for renovations to the central office complex, consolidating all of the offices here,” Cedars said. “It is all perfectly legal.”

St. Martin Parish President Chester Cedars said Tuesday evening that the administration is looking to fund several ambitious initiatives using funds from the American Rescue Plan Act:

• Water system consolidation — $1 million
• Broadband expansion — $3 million
• Water infrastructure in Water Works District 5 and along Highway 94 — $3.8 million
• Renovation of Technology Building on St. Luke Hospital site — $1 million
• General revenue recovery — $1 million
• Professional fees for consultants — $500,000

The St. Martin Parish Council, meeting as its various committees, also heard from:

• Public Works Director Kasey Courville, who gave a presentation on the flooding along Rookery Road at Lake Martin and explained that the parish would need at least two weeks of dry weather before the road could be repaired.
• Community Center Coordinator Kechia Lee, who gave an overview of the five centers across the parish.
• Waste Connections representative Jamie Gilbert, who answered questions about the company’s plans to begin working as the solid waste collection vendor for St. Martin Parish on Jan. 1. The company will provide once weekly trash pickup and twice monthly bulk yard waste and white goods service.