Executive Summary

Bergen County continues its response against the Covid-19 pandemic through mitigation, 

prevention, and preparedness. As the County’s revenues were decimated by the pandemic the 

SLFRF allows the County to make up for lost revenues without jeopardizing current services and 

while maximizing new services in areas of need due to the pandemic. These areas vary from 

public health and behavioral health initiatives, educational disparities, assistance to households, 

housing and homelessness, wastewater testing, and other infrastructure needs. Additionally,

there is current planning to expand to additional areas, such as assistance to small businesses, 

assisting the unemployed, and focusing on healthy childhood environments. 

The County of Bergen will continue to offset salaries directly related to those working directly 

on COVID-19 missions within the Health, Human Services, and Public Safety departments. 

Further, when additional COVID-19 duties involving new pandemic programs, grants or other 

initiatives arrive, the County will consider premium pay for these employees. 

Infrastructure and broadband projections have become an essential need to continue serving the 

nearly million residents of Bergen County. During this pandemic it has become essential to 

bring more government services to people. The best practice in this regard is to eliminate 

outdated paper-driven and in-person methods with digital solutions. Bergen also has a Countywide broadband project underway where more internet access will be available for all county 

residents and specifically the underserviced by running fiber to all 70 municipalities and county 

facilities.

Planning for SLFRF use before the interim final rules were published, May 7, 2021, and without 

knowing the full allocation amount, received June 4, 2021 made this first report more difficult to 

include exact numbers as we are still in the planning stage. Some allocations have a budget and 

full initiatives are still being planned and will be included in future reports. 

Use of Funds

The County’s ongoing and proposed projects using ARP funding seek to address the expenditure 

categories in the following ways:

a. Public Health – The County has expansive public health plans regarding the pandemic. 

The County plans to continue both its testing and mobile vaccination clinics, using 

federal funding to support such efforts, as Bergen leads the State in vaccination rates.. 

The County has two mobile vaccination vehicles which are equipped to provide medical 

care anywhere in the County, allowing the Bergen County Department of Health to target 

the communities most in need. The County has found that many in underserved 

communities, particularly those who engage in shift work and/or are undocumented, are 

reluctant or unable to come to the larger vaccine megasites and using the mobile vans 

allows the County to remove some barriers to receiving vaccination. The vans will also 

allow the County to provide more basic health services simultaneously, such as flu 

vaccinations, as well as checkup and other supporting health services for COVID “long 
haulers.” The county has made additional Mental Health funding available to local 

partner agencies in response to the increased need, allocating an additional 10% of 

budgetary funding to these agencies in 2021 and 2022, as well as encumbering an 

additional $1,000,000 for the County’s in-house mental health division to expand its 

programming.

b. Negative Economic Impacts – The County established the Food Security Task Force in 

2020 to bring leadership, logistical support, and financial assistance to Bergen County’s 

network of nonprofit and faith-based food pantries. This has allowed the County to

address both chronic hunger and the newly needy in a holistic, regional manner. 

Continuing to provide funding to the Task Force will allow food pantries to obtain food 

management logistics software, assist with bulk purchases taking advantage of economies 

of scale that directly benefits clients, and provide pantries with other needed technology 

solutions such as refrigerators. This will dovetail into the County’s other efforts to 

expand Meals on Wheels services and ensure food is delivered to homebound individuals 

or other vulnerable residents who cannot leave their homes due to the ongoing pandemic. 

c. Services to Disproportionally Impacted Communities – The County’s experience with the 

pandemic is that many families are newly needy and facing hardships, while many 

families are still chronically unable to access services, particularly when lacking stable 

housing. The lack of shelter for an otherwise transient family may pose an additional 

public health risk, and has impacts on children’s education, nutrition, and development. 

Partnering with Bergen County’s social service agencies, the County plans to continue 

supporting its newly established Family Shelter in Hackensack. This shelter provides 

emergency shelter to families in need, while connecting them with wraparound services 

and puts them on a path to stable housing. Combined with the County’s Emergency 

Rental Assistance Program, the County is taking significant steps to prevent or remediate 

homelessness.

d. Premium Pay – The County plans on using Federal COVID funds to offset the salaries of 

those working directly on COVID response in the Health, Human Services, and Public 

Safety departments. With numerous ongoing COVID-19 testing and vaccination efforts, 

the County will pay a hazard pay premium to its of frontline medical and support 

personnel who have worked continuously throughout the pandemic to provide necessary 

COVID-19 response services to residents. 

e. Water, Sewer, Broadband Infrastructure – The County of Bergen has undertaken a largescale fiber optic installation, linking all County facilities in a broadband loop. This 

project will include fiber branches to Bergen County’s municipalities, many of whom 

have their own fiber networks, as well as libraries, community centers, senior centers, 

and schools. This will create broadband infrastructure redundancy while offering 

broadband access to municipalities and community organizations at lower cost than 

private ISPs. The addition of libraries and free wireless internet will ensure residents, 

regardless of home connectivity, can access services and educational/employment 

opportunities. Regarding water, the County plans on expanding its COVID-19 

wastewater testing program, which has proved a great success in detecting COVID and 
guiding response to the areas that need it most, without having to wait for residents to test 

positive.

f. Revenue Replacement – With many of its facilities closed, the County incurred 

significant revenue loss from parks revenue, public works permit fees, grant 

opportunities, etc. ARP funding will help offset revenue loss for 2020, 2021, and the first 

6 months of 2022.

Promoting Equitable Outcomes

Overall Equity

a. Goals: The County’s use of ARP funding is aimed at addressing historically underserved 

communities in Bergen County. The County’s overall goal in this regard is to develop 

programs that emphasize assistance to these groups, increase outreach and information 

efforts to these groups, and ensure programs can be accessed easily by the most 

underserved. 

b. The County can provide significant assistance to these groups with COVID-19 and other 

related response, however the largest barriers are linguistic as well as community 

reluctance to engage with services. The County has engaged with media outlets to 

publicize programs, including Spanish and Korean language media, and has access to 

linguistic translation services to serve the sizeable foreign-born populations in Bergen. 

The County also plans on working with houses of worship, community leaders, and civic 

organizations to coordinate on programming and assist with getting the word out.

c. The County intends on removing barriers to access wherever possible. All websites will 

be designed with accessibility and readability in mind, low-bandwidth versions wherever 

possible, and give an option for telephone conversations for those without computer or 

internet access. The County will constantly assess its eligibility criteria for various 

programs to ensure they are accessible and equitable. 

d. Outcomes are intended to close gaps in areas such as internet access, hunger/nutrition, 

educational and internship opportunities, and assistance to the mental health and 

disability communities, as well as elderly/homebound individuals.

Economic & Racial Equality

a. Negative Economic Impacts – The County has established the Food Security Task Force 

and Family Shelter to assist with food and housing needs. These tend to draw from 

underserved communities but the County has made consistent outreach efforts to these 

communities to ensure awareness of the programs and remove barriers to entry (such as 

language or eligibility criteria). The County also intends to provide additional services to 

disabled, elderly, or mentally ill individuals, with additional funding for adult daycare, 

recreational and job opportunities for the disabled, housing support, and mental health 

crisis intervention and awareness.

b. Services to Disproportionally Impacted Communities – The County’s mobile vaccination 

vehicles will be outfitted with additional services such as flu vaccines, health support 

personnel for long-haul COVID sufferers, and other basic medical screening and 
assistance. These will allow the County to put “boots on the ground” in disproportionally 

impacted communities and offer not just COVID assistance, but routine medical care as 

well. Additionally, planned job training and apprenticeship programs will assist high 

school students with educational support and assist with retraining of adult workers. The 

County is also exploring assistance with childcare and aftercare, particularly for those 

who must return to work but still have the financial and logistical burdens of childcare.

Qualitative and Qualitative Data

With the Food Security Task Force, the County has measured local need and responded to 

communities that need it most. This is made more difficult due to the newly needy/hungry 

across the County, but the County’s network of nonprofit partners have been invaluable in 

ensuring efforts are focused equitably and help often overlooked and underserved communities.

Community Engagement

The County is using a holistic method of engaging with the community, to receive feedback from 

residents, promulgate information about programs, and raise awareness. The County maintains 

internal communications personnel who engage with media outlets, and plan to expend 

advertising funds focused on robust media engagement including web, social media, billboard, 

and newspaper advertisement, including sizeable investment in Spanish and Korean to serve the 

largest non-English speaking populations in the County. To further engage with these groups 

and communities of color, the County externally engages with community leaders, houses of 

worship, and civic organizations to ensure penetration into these communities. The County also 

has employed translation services to accommodate for additional communities of limited English 

proficiency such as Turkish, Polish, Chinese, Filipino, and other groups. The County further will 

work with these aforementioned groups, local elected leaders, and others to incorporate this 

feedback and improve programming or remove barriers.

Labor Practices

The County of Bergen contracts pursuant to the New Jersey Local Public Contracts Law and 

related acts to ensure that all contractors are competing on a fair and equal footing to achieve an 

award to the lowest responsive responsible bidder. The technical requirements of all public 

works projects include references and requirements to the following statutes, which are provided 

below with a brief explanation. 

A. N.J.S.A. 10:5-31 et seq. and N.J.A.C. 17:27 et seq., this statute stipulates Affirmative 

Action compliance requiring all construction contracts to report on the diversity of their 

workforce which will, or have worked on the job site. 

B. NJSA 34:11-56.25 et seq, known as the New Jersey Prevailing Wage Act. This statute 

sets forth the minimum wage at which each craftwork shall be paid depending on the task 

being performed. Often referred to as NJ’s Little Davis Bacon Act, the wage rates 

generally match that of the Davis Bacon Act, however if there is an inconsistency the 

worker would be entitled to the higher of the two conflicting wage rates. 
C. NJSA 34:11-56.48 et seq, known as the NJ Public Works Contractor Registration Act. 

This act sets forth a minimum standard all public works contractors need to meet in order 

to be eligible to perform public work in the State of New Jersey. This includes a basic 

requirement that the contractor applying for a registration application comply with at 

least one of five ways to participate in a registered apprenticeship program including but 

not limited being a signatory to a collective bargaining agreement, or to be a sponsor of 

an US Department of Labor apprenticeship program. 

Additionally on a case-by-case basis and as allowable by law the County of Bergen requires a 

Project Labor Agreement be included into all bids specifications for public works contracts, which 

will equal or exceed $5,000,000 in direct construction costs. Each project labor agreement 

executed pursuant to the provisions of NJ Public Law 2021 Chapter 69 shall:

 a. Advance the interests of the public entity, including the interests in cost, efficiency, quality, 

timeliness, skilled labor force, and safety;

 b. Contain guarantees against strikes, lock-outs, or other similar actions;

 c. Set forth effective, immediate, and mutually binding procedures for resolving jurisdictional 

and labor disputes arising before the completion of the work;

 d. Be made binding on all contractors and subcontractors on the public works project through 

the inclusion of appropriate bid specifications in all relevant bid documents;

 e. Require that each contractor and subcontractor working on the public works project have 

an apprenticeship program;

 f. Fully conform to all statutes, regulations, executive orders and applicable local ordinances 

regarding the implementation of set-aside goals for women and minority owned businesses, the 

obligation to comply with which shall be expressly provided in the project labor agreement;

Use of Evidence

The County has established significant experience in COVID-19 related programs due to 

implementation of CARES and other funding, and has used those lessons to improve programs 

planned for ARP. Program evaluation will be performed to assure that funding is being spent 

efficiency and with the stated program goal of increasing equity to underserved and 

disproportionally impacted groups. The County carefully weighs feedback from programs on an 

ongoing basis and determines what, if any, rule changes or programmatic changes must be made 

to improve service delivery.

Table of Expenses by Expenditure Category

In this section, list the amount of funds used in each Expenditure Category. The table should 

include cumulative expenses to date within each category, and the additional amount spent 

within each category since the last annual Recovery Plan. 

Jurisdictions may modify the table as needed by deleting unused rows where they have not 

expended any funds or by adding columns to more clearly characterize their program 

expenditures over time.
For the initial Recovery Plan, the amounts listed for “Cumulative expenditures to date” and 

“Amount spent since last Recovery Plan” will be equal.

Category Cumulative 

expenditures to 

date ($)

Amount spent 

since last 

Recovery Plan

1 Expenditure Category: Public Health

1.1 COVID-19 Vaccination $52,500.00

1.2 COVID-19 Testing

1.3 COVID-19 Contact Tracing

1.4 Prevention in Congregate Settings (Nursing 

Homes, Prisons/Jails, Dense Work Sites, 

Schools, etc.)

$68,047.46

1.5 Personal Protective Equipment

1.6 Medical Expenses (including Alternative Care 

Facilities)

1.7 Capital Investments or Physical Plant Changes 

to Public Facilities that respond to the COVID19 public health emergency

1.8 Other COVID-19 Public Health Expenses 

(including Communications, Enforcement, 

Isolation/Quarantine)

1.9 Payroll Costs for Public Health, Safety, and 

Other Public Sector Staff Responding to 

COVID-19

$1,200,000

1.10 Mental Health Services $163,000

1.11 Substance Use Services

1.12 Other Public Health Services

2 Expenditure Category: Negative Economic 

Impacts

2.1 Household Assistance: Food Programs $875.75

2.2 Household Assistance: Rent, Mortgage, and 

Utility Aid 

2.3 Household Assistance: Cash Transfers 

2.4 Household Assistance: Internet Access 

Programs

2.5 Household Assistance: Eviction Prevention

2.6 Unemployment Benefits or Cash Assistance to 

Unemployed Workers

2.7 Job Training Assistance (e.g., Sectoral jobtraining, Subsidized Employment, Employment 

Supports or Incentives)

2.8 Contributions to UI Trust Funds*

2.9 Small Business Economic Assistance (General)

2.10 Aid to nonprofit organizations

2.11 Aid to Tourism, Travel, or Hospitality

2.12 Aid to Other Impacted Industries
Category Cumulative 

expenditures to 

date ($)

Amount spent 

since last 

Recovery Plan

2.13 Other Economic Support 

2.14 Rehiring Public Sector Staff

3 Expenditure Category: Services to 

Disproportionately Impacted Communities

3.1 Education Assistance: Early Learning 

3.2 Education Assistance: Aid to High-Poverty 

Districts

3.3 Education Assistance: Academic Services 

3.4 Education Assistance: Social, Emotional, and 

Mental Health Services 

3.5 Education Assistance: Other 

3.6 Healthy Childhood Environments: Child Care 

3.7 Healthy Childhood Environments: Home Visiting 

3.8 Healthy Childhood Environments: Services to 

Foster Youth or Families Involved in Child 

Welfare System 

3.9. Healthy Childhood Environments: Other 

3.10 Housing Support: Affordable Housing 

3.11 Housing Support: Services for Unhoused 

persons 

3.12 Housing Support: Other Housing Assistance 

3.13 Social Determinants of Health: Other 

3.14 Social Determinants of Health: Community 

Health Workers or Benefits Navigators 

3.15 Social Determinants of Health: Lead 

Remediation

3.16 Social Determinants of Health: Community 

Violence Interventions 

4 Expenditure Category: Premium Pay

4.1 Public Sector Employees $250,000

4.2 Private Sector: Grants to other employers 

5 Expenditure Category: Infrastructure

5.1 Clean Water: Centralized wastewater treatment

5.2 Clean Water: Centralized wastewater collection 

and conveyance

5.3 Clean Water: Decentralized wastewater

5.4 Clean Water: Combined sewer overflows

5.5 Clean Water: Other sewer infrastructure

5.6 Clean Water: Stormwater

5.7 Clean Water: Energy conservation

5.8 Clean Water: Water conservation

5.9 Clean Water: Nonpoint source 
Category Cumulative 

expenditures to 

date ($)

Amount spent 

since last 

Recovery Plan

5.10 Drinking water: Treatment

5.11 Drinking water: Transmission & distribution

5.12 Drinking water: Transmission & distribution: 

lead remediation

5.13 Drinking water: Source

5.14 Drinking water: Storage 

5.15 Drinking water: Other water infrastructure

5.16 Broadband: “Last Mile” projects

5.17 Broadband: Other projects

6 Expenditure Category: Revenue Replacement

6.1 Provision of Government Services $58,26,461.00

7 Administrative and Other

7.1 Administrative Expenses 

7.2 Evaluation and data analysis 

7.3 Transfers to Other Units of Government

7.4 Transfers to Nonentitlement Units 

(States and Territories only)

See Section C(7) on page 27 of the Reporting Guidance for additional information.