(Michael Izquierdo / WTTW News)

Chicago has yet to spend approximately $300 million in federal relief funds officials promised to use to strengthen the city’s tattered social safety net and provide direct aid to Chicagoans struggling to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a WTTW News analysis.

Between March 2021 and June 2024, Chicago spent more than $238.8 million on a host of programs including affordable housing, mental health, violence prevention, youth job programs and help for unhoused Chicagoans, according to the most recent reports filed with the U.S. Department of the Treasury as required by federal law.

That is approximately 44% of the $540 million Chicago officials set aside from the city’s $1.9 billion share of the federal relief package known as the American Rescue Plan Act, or ARPA.

City officials are scheduled to publish reports detailing how they spent federal COVID-19 relief funds in the second half of 2024 by Jan. 31.

The city spent an additional $1.3 billion in federal COVID-19 relief funds to shore up Chicago’s pandemic-devastated budgets from 2021 through 2024, according to the Treasury Department report.

Under rules established by the federal government, Chicago officials have until 2026 to spend all of the federal funds the city got to repair the damage caused by the pandemic. Mayor Brandon Johnson promised to use those funds to invest in communities where residents are suffering as a result of decades of disinvestment.

However, the money must be budgeted by the end of this year, which means this is the last chance for Johnson and the Chicago City Council to finalize how the remaining funds should be used.

Those decisions must be made as Chicago leaders stare into a financial abyss after hitting the so-called “fiscal cliff,” now that Chicago’s federal COVID-19 relief funds have been nearly exhausted.

Johnson is set to lay out his plan on Wednesday to fill not just the projected $982.4 million shortfall facing the city in 2025 but also the $222.9 million gap in this year’s city budget. The City Council faces a deadline of Dec. 31 to approve a spending plan.

The Civic Federation, a nonpartisan budget watchdog group, urged Johnson and the City Council to consider using the unspent COVID-19 relief funds to balance the city’s budget. 

That could “relieve pressures from the core operating budget deficit,” according to a report from Joseph Ferguson, the head of the Civic Federation and the city’s former inspector general.

“However, it is important to recognize that any such funds would be non-recurring and could cause shortfalls in those programs in future budgets,” according to the report. “Priority might therefore be given to uses for which a one-time front-end investment might bring long-term benefit without future budget obligation, such as affordable housing.”

Former Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration struggled to make good on promises to use the influx of cash from the federal government to repair the damage caused by the pandemic, which killed more than 8,300 Chicagoans, hospitalized more than 60,000 and upended the lives of millions across the United States.

When Johnson took office, he charged Budget Director Annette Guzman with fixing the city’s efforts to spend the federal relief money. A restructured plan was presented to the City Council in June and rebranded from Lightfoot’s “Chicago Recovery Plan” to Johnson’s “Road to Recovery” initiative.

The latest reports to the Treasury Department reflect that new plan, which moves $80 million from programs at highest risk of blowing the deadlines into programs that city officials can implement quickly. That effort is divided into six categories: housing and homelessness supports; human rights, arts and culture; effective governance; community safety; youth and economy; and mental health and wellness.

That new plan includes $32 million to restart the effort that sent $500 per month to Chicagoans living below the federal poverty line as part of a basic income program, records show.

The revised plan also calls for additional funding for efforts to create jobs for young Chicagoans, and to shelter Chicagoans experiencing homelessness as quickly as possible, records show.

Although Guzman promised to send monthly reports to the City Council, the city’s website does not include the report for September. City budget officials have also yet to publish a dashboard as promised to detail how the federal COVID-19 relief funds have been spent.

On top of the federal COVID-19 relief funds, the plan crafted by Lightfoot called for the city to borrow an additional $660 million to help mend the city’s social safety net and address long-standing needs, like the expansion of affordable housing and efforts to combat climate change.

In 2023, city officials borrowed $170 million to fund those projects, officials said.

A spokesperson for the city’s Office of Budget and Management could not immediately detail for WTTW News how much the city had borrowed in 2024 to fund the Chicago Recovery Plan or spent to date to fund its priorities.

Contact Heather Cherone: @HeatherCherone | (773) 569-1863 | [email protected]