Zanesville Mayor Hosts Discussion on How Cares Act Money is Being Spent

ZANESVILLE – State Auditor Keith Faber, Zanesville Mayor Don Mason, State Senator Tim Schaffer and State Representative Adam Holmes were also featured in the discussion. Mason says that the goal has been to use the corona virus relief funds for groups and interests that have been impacted most from COVID.

“We are using it to help children, elderly, and those entities serving those groups. Again, Christ’s Table is a wonderful organization that has been feeding those and those costs have gone up tremendously due to COVID. When you look at Eastside Ministry, again, another great organization serving our community, they’ve been greatly impacted,” Mason said.

Funds from the CARES Act need to be spent by the end of the year. That can create difficulty for allocating funds for children who need to receive an education during the pandemic.

“I fully anticipate those children who are disrupted will have those lives disrupted into the rest of the academic year; January through May. So, we will be looking for additional community resources to keep these children and other entities really funded through the rest of the academic calendar through May because it would be nice if this whole thing could be behind us by December but I suspect it’ll be a slow integration back to normalcy by middle of next year,” Mason said.

Mason says that $550,000 from CARES Act money has been used for community affairs.