The Big Payout: Colorado received close to $66 billion in pandemic aid. We tracked where that money went.

Colorado obtained almost $66 billion in federal pandemic help over the previous two years, a river of cash that made its approach to each nook of the state — from vacationer sights excessive within the mountains to giant universities and hospitals alongside the Entrance Vary right down to tiny Predominant Avenue diners that dot the Jap Plains.

The Denver Submit examined greater than 367,000 loans, grants and awards from a number of federal companies in a first-of-its-kind evaluation monitoring how federal {dollars} filtered their approach right down to the state’s 64 counties. Distributions have been hardly even, and the federal response, above and past the pandemic, seemingly triggered the hole between the haves and have-nots within the state to widen.

Denver, Arapahoe and El Paso counties alone captured 44 cents of each federal greenback in help that might be localized. A dozen resort counties obtained as a lot federal cash because the remaining 40 rural counties, although these rural counties had 186,000 extra residents. Pitkin County, dwelling to Aspen, pulled in 5.5 occasions as a lot cash per resident as Crowley, one of many poorest counties within the state.

Coloradans earned $8,000 extra on common in earnings final 12 months than they did earlier than COVID-19 hit. Increased incomes and better financial savings accrued disproportionately to households already within the upper-income brackets. Residence values and inventory costs surged as a result of federal insurance policies, boosting the wealth of individuals holding these property.

“We are able to argue whether or not this was an excessive amount of stimulus, however you may’t argue about whether or not it labored. It labored,” stated Richard Wobbekind, a senior economist on the College of Colorado Boulder Leeds College of Enterprise.

The Colorado financial system regained its pre-pandemic output in simply over a 12 months. The state recovered the 374,500 jobs misplaced after COVID-19 got here on the scene in below two years, a a lot quicker rebound than what adopted the prior two recessions.

The federal cash went to quite a lot of issues — offering protecting gear, funding the transition to distant studying at faculties, saving hundreds of service jobs, serving to eating places and well being care suppliers get well misplaced revenues, and in a use elevating eyebrows, funding two golf course irrigation methods in Colorado Springs.

The federal assist was unprecedented, large and can proceed to reshape the financial system for years to come back because the state and native governments work to spend one other $5.8 billion in federal restoration funds.

An surprising blow

State leaders scrimped and saved final decade, pulling collectively almost $900 million in reserves to climate surprising tough patches Colorado would possibly face. When the pandemic hit in March 2020, they shortly realized it wouldn’t be sufficient.

“We have been watching weekly and we burned by way of our 7.25% reserve (about $900 million) in 90 days. It was terrifying,” stated Lauren Larson, director of the Governor’s Workplace of State Planning and Budgeting, recalling the early weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ski resorts, casinos, live performance halls, nonessential retail shops and eating places shut down. Employers despatched staff dwelling, emptying out downtown buildings and workplace parks. Collapsing oil costs put a cease to drilling. The state’s unemployment fee shot up from a really low 2.8% to a post-war excessive of 11.8% in simply three months. Dislocated staff crushed the state’s overwhelmed and underfunded unemployment insurance coverage system. By the top of the second quarter of 2020, Colorado’s GDP plunged an unprecedented 8%.

“The governor, in partnership with the legislature, made an actual strategic allocation of these (reserve) funds and that basically supported our companies and our workforce; these have been key selections within the early days,” Larson stated.

However by itself, state cash represented a drop within the bucket. The federal authorities would wish to step in, and it did. Abandoning the restraint proven in prior downturns, the Trump administration and Congress shortly assembled a $2 trillion bundle generally known as the Coronavirus Help, Reduction, and Financial Safety Act in late March 2020.

The CARES Act is the most important federal support bundle in U.S. historical past, and Congress handed different smaller funding measures till a 12 months later, one other $1.9 trillion was authorized below American Rescue Plan Act or ARPA. In all, the federal authorities licensed $4.61 trillion in COVID-19 reduction, obligated $4.15 trillion and spent $3.62 trillion, in keeping with the web site USASpending.gov.

The Denver Submit examined the 22 largest authorities help applications through the pandemic, which offered $63.17 billion in support to Colorado as of mid-January, in keeping with a COVID-19 help tracker from the Peter G. Peterson Basis.

Diving into federal authorities databases, the Submit assigned awards with an deal with to particular person counties. In instances the place the data was partial, distributions have been extrapolated. And in instances the place no deal with was out there, however options have been, comparable to a county’s share of tax returns or unemployment claims, distributions have been estimated.

In all, the evaluation assigned $54.8 billion or 87% of the federal help from these bigger applications to a selected county. A portion of the cash that couldn’t be assigned to a county went on to the state.

Colorado’s $63.17 billion in help ranked twentieth between Minnesota and Missouri, the spot anticipated given the scale of its inhabitants. On a per-capita foundation, Colorado obtained $10,970 per particular person in direct federal help from these main applications, which ranks twenty eighth amongst states, between Florida and Texas.

Whereas complete, the Peterson tracker didn’t embody $386 million in help airways within the state obtained, baby care tax credit price $1.53 billion and distributions from smaller applications. The Committee for a Accountable Federal Finances places Colorado’s take of federal help at nearer to $65.8 billion, or $11,378 per particular person, with $61.7 billion disbursed or dedicated. Past that, the Federal Reserve offered one other $746 million in lending services and different help within the state.

A more recent and greater deal

To place COVID-19 help in perspective, the American Restoration and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the principle measure Congress handed to combat the Nice Recession, totaled $840 billion on the time, or about $2,738 per particular person. Adjusted into present {dollars}, that will be price about $3,679, in keeping with a shopper inflation calculator from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The New Deal, the Roosevelt administration’s effort to raise the nation out of the Nice Melancholy, value $653 billion or $5,231 per particular person in 2009 {dollars}, in keeping with an evaluation from the Federal Reserve Financial institution of St. Louis. That works out to $7,029 in present {dollars}.

Federal COVID-19 help was greater than six-fold the $10 billion decline in Colorado GDP between 2019 and 2020. It’s 4 occasions the $16.2 billion normally fund revenues the state expects to gather in fiscal 2021-2022. And for a comparability that sports activities followers can relate to, the Denver Broncos might promote for round $4 billion, a document quantity for an NFL workforce. The federal authorities offered Colorado with sufficient cash to purchase 16 groups at that value.

Though Colorado obtained the quantity of help anticipated versus different states given its inhabitants, distributions throughout the state have been lumpy when measured towards every county’s inhabitants.

The per capita common of cash that might be localized was $9,482 with distributions throughout the state starting from $19,545 in Pitkin, the state’s wealthiest county, to $3,497 in Crowley, the place almost three in 10 residents fall beneath the poverty line. Rural counties that didn’t have a ski resort usually obtained considerably much less cash per resident.

“It isn’t a straightforward factor to spend cash and achieve this legitimately and in an orderly approach,” stated Stephan Weiler, director of Colorado State College’s Regional Financial Growth Institute, which research points associated to the rural-urban divide.

Two key sources of help — the Paycheck Safety Program and federal unemployment advantages — have been stood up shortly with lax safeguards due to a want to get as a lot cash out the door as shortly as potential. The extent of the fraud continues to be being uncovered, however it’s seemingly tens of billions of {dollars} nationally have been siphoned off by home scammers and worldwide crime rings.

Each applications have been additionally application-based and never all the time straightforward for people to navigate. PPP lending particularly demonstrated large variations throughout the state. When it got here to the distribution of federal COVID-19 funds, the pre-existing financial divisions in Colorado and elsewhere have been strengthened, Weiler stated.

The place the cash went, and the place it didn’t

Federal distributions flowed most freely to the locations that had the most individuals and financial exercise, a case of {dollars} following density. Round 44% of federal pandemic {dollars} went to the state’s three most populated counties — Denver, Arapahoe and El Paso.

These three counties account for about 36% of the state’s inhabitants and 44% of state GDP. Every county’s share of help lined up with its contribution to the financial output of the state.

Denver County, with its excessive focus of presidency, medical, instructional, tourism, leisure and enterprise actions, was the epicenter of COVID-19 reduction in Colorado, receiving $12 billion or 22% of the funds assigned to a county. From the evaporation of enterprise journey to shuttered live performance halls to empty workplace buildings — Denver was hit exhausting in about each space possible. It additionally led when it got here to distributions from most federal pandemic help applications in Colorado.

Arapahoe County was second general with $6.85 billion or 12.5% of pandemic funding. The county was a frontrunner in claiming funds to help well being care suppliers get well misplaced revenues. Centennial-based Centura Well being, a number one hospital group with a number of subsidiaries and areas throughout Colorado, claimed a big share of these funds.

El Paso County, which barely edges out Denver in inhabitants, obtained 9.9% of the county-assigned whole or $5.4 billion.  A heavier reliance on army and protection spending left that county’s financial system extra resilient within the face of the pandemic.

An engrained bent towards self-reliance and mistrust of the federal authorities, together with issues about deficit spending, may need additionally resulted in additional politically conservative components of the state looking for much less assist, stated Brian Lewandowski, government director of the Enterprise Analysis Division on the Leeds College of Enterprise.

Although it obtained lower than half as a lot federal pandemic help as Denver, Colorado Springs is restoring jobs at a fee nicely forward of metro Denver and second solely to Grand Junction, in keeping with the Colorado Division of Labor and Employment.

One other approach to examine distributions is by what counties obtained per resident. Colorado’s dozen metropolitan counties obtained localized federal help averaging $9,574 per resident, not removed from the statewide common of $9,482 per particular person.

The divide was wider in rural areas. A dozen rural ski resort counties obtained $11,652 per resident, led by Pitkin County at $19,545 and San Miguel, dwelling to Telluride, at $17,286 per resident  Non-resort rural counties, in contrast obtained $7,202 per resident.

COVID-19 instances hit Colorado proper in March, forcing ski resorts to shut prematurely and inflicting a lack of revenues in a profitable interval not just for resorts however surrounding eating places, lodging suppliers and retailers. Hundreds of workers who rely closely on ideas, from restaurant servers to ski instructors, noticed that spigot of additional money minimize off. These staff then discovered themselves laid off, leading to elevated charges of unemployment claims in resort counties. The pandemic shutdowns additionally depressed summer time tourism in 2020.

“A lot of our locals depend on that top season to get them by way of the 12 months,” stated Debbie Braun, president and CEO of the Aspen Chamber Resort Affiliation. “So it was a reasonably crushing blow once we needed to shut the resorts for the season.”

Although resort counties attracted extra of their rich second-home residents and highly-paid distant staff looking for to flee crowded city areas, service staff in these areas struggled.

On the different excessive, lots of the counties on the backside finish when it got here to receiving federal help struggled with poverty charges above the statewide common and family incomes considerably beneath — traits that will counsel they wanted extra assist, not much less, through the pandemic. That group included Crowley, Fremont, Bent, Custer, Conejos, Hinsdale, Delta, Costilla and Moffat counties.

However not each county on the backside match that sample. Elbert County obtained the fourth-lowest quantity per resident in federal support at $5,451 and Douglas County was the seventh-lowest at $6,316 per resident. Each counties rank excessive for family earnings and low for his or her poverty charges. Their economies don’t rely so closely on tourism, relying extra on high-paying skilled and technical jobs, which fared higher through the downturn.

Apply or get left behind

Some counties lack medical services or faculties, which restricted the well being care and schooling help they obtained. Others have been lucky to undergo fewer job losses, decreasing the draw their residents made on the unemployment system. However the important thing to understanding lopsided distributions in Colorado comes by inspecting enterprise help.

Federal pandemic funding will be divided into 5 huge buckets — private help at $23.3 billion or 37% of the full; enterprise help at $21.1 billion or a 3rd of what Colorado obtained; state and native authorities help at $10.8 billion or 17% of the full; well being care applications at $5.1 billion or 8.1%; and schooling at $2.9 billion or 4.6%.

Some federal applications assigned cash primarily based on inhabitants, a good however untargeted approach to get assist out. When it got here to enterprise reduction, the U.S. Small Enterprise Administration relied on purposes by way of lenders. Individuals who wanted assist needed to ask for it.

Greater than 1 / 4 of the federal pandemic help {dollars} in Colorado from the 22 largest applications, $15.1 billion or $2,604 per capita, got here by way of the Paycheck Safety Program. It was a brand new mortgage program designed to assist small companies with below 500 workers maintain their staff on the payroll. If the cash was spent saving jobs, the loans have been forgivable.

Enterprise help was greater than twice as excessive in resort areas because it was in non-resort areas on a per capita foundation, and the hole between the highest and backside counties was excessive. In Pitkin County, PPP loans labored out to $9,258 per capita or 3.6 occasions the state common, whereas in San Miguel County it was $6,054. On the different finish have been Costilla County, with $575 in PPP funding per resident and Crowley County at $502 per resident.

“We do know that there are extra companies per capita receiving help in resort communities than non-resort communities as a result of a really excessive share of consumers are imported, vacationers, in comparison with non-resort counties whose companies are extra closely depending on native residents,” stated Elizabeth Kosar, the state’s Financial Restoration Communications Coordinator.

As a result of resort areas have the next focus of companies than non-resort areas, it isn’t a shock that they drew in additional pandemic help from enterprise applications. Pitkin County, for instance, is dwelling to twenty occasions extra companies than Crowley, in keeping with the U.S. Census Bureau.

Whereas Weiler agrees that enterprise and job focus are a part of the equation, they don’t present a whole reply. Pitkin County might have 20 occasions extra companies than Crowley, but it surely obtained 55 occasions extra PPP funds.

To acquire a mortgage or grant from the SBA, enterprise house owners wanted to know in regards to the applications, decide their eligibility they usually wanted a lender prepared to work with them. That wasn’t all the time straightforward to tug off, particularly in areas the place communities are underbanked after years of mergers, closures and disinvestment.

“Not each space has a financial institution, particularly with all of the consolidation that has been occurring,” he stated. “You don’t have the personnel on the bottom and an ATM gained’t do you any good if you end up in search of a mortgage.”

Weiler researched pandemic lending nationwide and located that the variety of PPP loans per enterprise in a county correlated with the depth of banking sources. Banking “deserts” had fewer PPP loans per enterprise. Seen that approach, it isn’t simply that resort counties had extra companies, that they had extra banks prepared to work with these companies.

As a result of the cash was already there, the banks have been there. And since the banks have been there, companies in these counties tended to obtain extra federal {dollars} in help through the disaster.

Details about the completely different help applications, together with the rules, wasn’t all the time well timed, stated Melody Villard, a commissioner in Moffat County, which lagged when it got here to federal help.

“I feel perhaps some individuals simply didn’t have time to analysis or the data base to try this, not figuring out all of the implications,” she stated. “Factoring within the (Paycheck Safety Program) funds, quite a lot of our smaller companies and people didn’t apply for these funds.”

Anna Lighthizer is aware of that feeling. She was in the course of shifting her restaurant, The Scorching Pickle Restaurant and Lounge, from a bowling alley in Craig to a brand new spot within the fall of 2020. She discovered of some grants and loans that she may need certified for too late.

“I didn’t need to do the payroll stuff as a result of I didn’t need the loans and the payback stuff,” Lighthizer stated. “However a few of the different grants would’ve been good. We simply missed quite a lot of it. It was simply not figuring out, being model new and making an attempt to maintain your head above water.”

Lighthizer did get a $10,000 grant from a metropolis program for small companies.

Even in city areas the place banks are extra energetic, bigger clients have been favored when it got here to acquiring PPP loans, Weiler stated.

But, companies that took out smaller PPP loans of below $150,000 have been extra environment friendly at saving jobs, a Denver Submit evaluation discovered. In Colorado, it value the SBA on common $7,115 per job saved at corporations borrowing $150,000 or much less, however $10,807 per job at corporations borrowing greater than that quantity.

SBA Administrator Isabella Guzman acknowledged that the smallest of small companies and people with no banking relationship had a tougher time accessing pandemic help, one thing the SBA addressed in its second PPP spherical in 2021. It leaned extra closely on neighborhood monetary establishments and on-line lenders. It additionally earmarked funds for micro and deprived companies.

“We all know there have been gaps within the market,” she stated. “In 2021, we tried to fill these gaps with these on-line choices and help by way of our facilities and district workplaces.” Of the PPP loans that went out in 2021, 96% went to corporations with 20 or fewer employers, in keeping with the SBA.

One of many key architects of the Paycheck Safety Program, Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md., stated in a speech to Congress on March 25 that the SBA must create a direct-lending program to get round a few of the flaws uncovered through the pandemic.

“Now shouldn’t be the time to retreat. It’s time for us to double down. In implementing classes discovered over the lifetime of PPP, we must always create a brand new direct mortgage program inside SBA and additional empower small companies,” he stated.

Did the cash get the job finished?

If the aim of the COVID-19 help was to combat off the pandemic and shore up the financial system, it did that nicely. Colorado’s financial output or GDP recovered by the second quarter of 2021. All of the federal direct help offered to people — suppose stimulus checks and enhanced unemployment advantages — pushed incomes larger all through the pandemic, to the purpose that the common Coloradan made $8,000 extra in 2021 than in 2019, in keeping with the OSPB’s Colorado Outlook.

That’s not what is meant to occur throughout a recession. Shoppers nationally, restricted in how they may spend their cash, gathered $2.5 trillion in further financial savings through the pandemic and their internet price elevated by $24 trillion, a lot of it from dwelling value features, in keeping with a report final month from Brookings, a Washington, D.C.-based analysis and coverage group.

For the highest 1% of households, the achieve in internet price was 19 occasions that of the underside 20%, Brookings discovered.

A separate examine final summer time from Moody’s estimated that round 70% of the surplus financial savings generated through the pandemic ended up within the fingers of the highest 20% of households by earnings. They tended to be older, college-educated and householders. Owners captured 90% of extra financial savings, they usually obtained one other huge enhance of their wealth from quickly rising dwelling costs.

The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller dwelling value index for metro Denver is up by almost a 3rd for the reason that pandemic began, with a 20.8% achieve previously 12 months by way of January. CoreLogic estimates the standard home-owner in Colorado carrying a mortgage gained $75,000 in extra dwelling fairness final 12 months.

In February, job counts statewide returned to the place they have been earlier than the pandemic began. It took 21 months to get from peak unemployment to 4%, which contrasts with 42 months after the dot-com recession and 54 months after the housing-driven Nice Recession, in keeping with Ryan Gedney, senior economist on the Colorado Division of Labor and Employment.

Throughout the Nice Recession, job losses didn’t backside out till two years into the downturn, Lewandowski stated. It took below two years on this restoration to get all of them again.

“The federal response was actually, actually sturdy this time round,” Gedney stated. “While you take a look at the CARES Act, the Continued Help Act, the American Rescue Plan — there was quite a lot of effort and federal {dollars} pumped into the financial system to try to stimulate and spur on a quick restoration.”

But, all the cash pumped into the financial system is having unintended penalties. Client inflation in metro Denver hit 9.1% in March, its hottest tempo since 1982. Cars are briefly provide, leading to some used fashions costing greater than a brand new model. Employees are exhausting to search out and are switching jobs at a document fee. And good luck to anybody making an attempt to purchase a starter dwelling. Metro Denver ranks because the fifth least inexpensive housing market within the nation given incomes and Colorado Springs because the ninth least inexpensive.

Mary Daly, president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Financial institution of San Francisco, stated customers, unable to spend cash on providers as freely as they did earlier than the pandemic, centered extra of their spending on items. Manufacturing shortages and supply-chain points in delivering these items contributed to larger costs.

“We weathered the pandemic as an financial system higher than anyone thought,” she stated throughout a “fireplace chat” hosted by Brookings to debate the pandemic restoration. “Higher to have a bridge too lengthy than one too quick.”

However for some components of the Colorado financial system, the bridge by no means actually arrived. The statewide job restoration fee was simply shy of 102% in February, Gedney notes. Nearly each metro space within the state reclaimed or is near reclaiming the roles misplaced in March and April of 2020, besides one. Metro Greeley, which covers Weld County, a frontrunner nationally in job creation final decade, solely recaptured 47% of its pre-pandemic job counts.

The county’s higher focus of pure useful resource jobs explains why it’s lagging. Reduction applications have been rolled out for airways, eating places, leisure venues, well being care suppliers, faculties, small companies and native governments, however not for oil and fuel producers, although spot oil costs briefly turned damaging in early 2020.

Wobbekind and Weiler stated the commodity enterprise is cyclical by nature, which seemingly left policymakers reluctant to increase assist. However that lack of help through the pandemic could also be coming again to chunk as producers, nonetheless licking their wounds, are hesitant to drill even after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine despatched oil costs spiraling above $100 a barrel.

A second take

How federal help was distributed in Colorado various by geography. Increased financial savings and better features in internet price ensuing from the federal response accrued to essentially the most well-off households. And a few broken industries, comparable to oil and fuel, have been handed over utterly. However there’s a likelihood to deal with a few of these gaps.

Gov. Jared Polis’ administration and the Colorado legislature are understanding find out how to spend $3.8 billion in help the state obtained below the American Rescue Plan’s Fiscal Restoration Fund, whereas state, municipal and tribal governments have one other $1.9 billion to work with. The funds should be spent by 2026 and a push is on to search out one of the simplest ways to spend what some have described as a once-in-a-generation windfall.

Discussions amongst state and native leaders introduced three urgent issues to the floor — inexpensive housing, workforce coaching, and psychological and behavioral well being. All have been areas of excessive concern heading into the pandemic and made worse by the pandemic, stated Patrick Meyers, the state’s chief financial restoration officer.

The state’s fiscal limits imply that it is vitally exhausting to build up giant sums of cash briefly order to sort out essentially the most urgent issues. The fiscal restoration funds supply the possibility to do one thing huge.

“The governor has been very clear for the reason that cash got here in that he needed it for use for transformational initiatives. He didn’t need it to be unfold out,” Meyers stated.

The state desires to work collectively with native governments to leverage mixed {dollars} the place potential, Larson stated. However it’s a strategy of persuasion.

Native governments can spend as much as $10 million to backfill misplaced revenues. Past that, many are larger initiatives involving public well being, workforce coaching, financial help and infrastructure initiatives in water, sewer and broadband.

“The funds made out there are one to rescue and two to rebuild,” stated Teryn Zmuda, chief economist on the Nationwide Affiliation of Counties. “This is the reason it was so crucial for counties to obtain direct and versatile funding from the federal government. They’re closest to the individuals they usually know find out how to greatest make the most of these funds.”

Colorado’s largest counties, with 250,000 or extra residents, should file Restoration Plan Experiences with the U.S. Treasury Division. These studies present $132 million obligated throughout 41 initiatives, in keeping with NACO.

El Paso County is making use of $8 million towards consuming water infrastructure, $5 million in stormwater enchancment, and $6 million in “center mile” broadband, however Colorado Springs drew consideration after setting apart $6.5 million of its $76 million in funds to exchange irrigation methods at two golf programs.

Arapahoe County is directing $7 million to help small companies and $600,000 to teams that present meals help. Boulder County is offering $140,000 to extend cellular phone and know-how entry to the homeless and offered one other $300,000 for a Left Behind Employees Fund.

A number of payments handed over the last legislative session that centered on serving to teams and areas of the state that didn’t do as nicely at acquiring federal help, Kosar stated.

They included offering extra funding to the COVID-19 Small Enterprise Grant Program and to the Colorado Startup Mortgage Fund, almost $25 million to help artists and humanities organizations, and $10 million for a conferences and occasions incentive program. The Colorado Workplace of Financial Growth and Worldwide Commerce additionally created a free-standing Rural Alternative Workplace to supply higher help to rural communities earlier this month.

Small enterprise house owners nonetheless report they’re hurting, with solely 23% nationally saying they’ve returned to regular operations on the finish of March, in keeping with the U.S. Census Bureau’s Small Enterprise Pulse Survey. In Colorado, a fifth of small companies stated the pandemic had a big damaging affect on them, whereas 43% described it as a average damaging affect.

The federal authorities might have had the fitting intention in making an attempt to assist small companies, however its applications weren’t environment friendly, Weiler stated. State and native governments ought to see if they will do higher with the funds left at their discretion.

A examine from the Peter G. Peterson Basis estimates that $1.01 in boosted GDP got here from each federal greenback spent on well being, schooling, transportation and emergency administration through the pandemic. Enhanced federal unemployment advantages returned 75 cents per $1 spent, whereas fiscal restoration funds offered to state and native governments are anticipated to generate 62 cents per $1 spent.

Monetary help to companies through the pandemic solely generated $0.31 in added GDP for every $1 spent.

Denver Submit reporters Judith Kohler and Jon Murray contributed to this report.