The COVID pandemic impacted our community in many ways, and thanks to American Rescue Plan Act Immediate Needs Grant funding, local organizations were able to weather some of those impacts.

Larimer County used Immediate Needs Grant Funding [INGF] as a conduit to quickly get these urgently needed ARPA funds to organizations to help fund transformational programs in our community. 

Two ING organizations receiving funding highlighted their use of the funds and how their organizations were able to benefit our community at the Board of Larimer County Commissioners Administrative Matters meeting this week.

The Poudre River Library District https://www.poudrelibraries.org/ used their $28,700 ING grant to buy 20 kits that enabled remote work for school children. Two of the packs are also being used in the library district’s mobile unit, Evie [another grant recipient], too. They also used the funding to secure hot spots for the kits for online connectivity.

The funds also helped purchase additional iPads, and charging devices,  for many other online activities. Having more kits enabled checkout time for the kits to be expanded from 1 week to six weeks.

The other organization, Teaching Tree Early Childhood Learning Center, https://teaching-tree.org/  received $97,448 to be used for classroom cohorting, which helped them keep their classrooms together, open, and safe. Having safer classrooms enabled parents to work more consistently while allowing Learning Tree to extend their hours of operation.

Teaching Tree is the largest non-profit childcare provider in Larimer County. The funding enabled quality childcare to continue for low and middle-income families in Larimer County.

During 2022, 433 students were served at both Teaching Tree locations in Loveland and Fort Collins, with 170 low-income families supported by scholarship funding.