Gov. Brian Kemp is earmarking $250 million in federal COVID-19 relief for neighborhood recreation improvements in some of Georgia’s poorest areas.
Grants of up to $2 million per project can be used by local governments or nonprofit groups to improve, repair or maintain parks, recreation facilities, sidewalks and healthy food access, Kemp announced Tuesday.
The money can be spent in census tracts with poverty rates generally worse than 20% in 2019. Statewide, Georgia has a poverty rate of 14%, according to the Census Bureau.
Because of that limitation, the money is likely to flow mostly to areas dominated by Democratic voters, even as Democrats howl that the Republican Kemp is trying to spend federal money he opposed to shore up his reelection. For example, only about 10 census tracts in heavily Republican north Georgia are eligible outside neighborhoods in Rome, Gainesville and Dalton that are dominated by Black and Hispanic voters.
The state says encouraging physical activity and healthy eating improves health because parks and recreation facilities allow for socially distanced recreation despite COVID-19.
