More Cities With Significant African-American Populations Should Be Eligible for Coronavirus Aid

NATIONAL URBAN LEAGUE: MAKE MORE CITIES WITH SIGNIFICANT AFRICAN-AMERICAN POPULATIONS ELIGIBLE FOR CORONAVIRUS AID

NEW YORK (April 13, 2020) -- The National Urban League today urged Federal Reserve Chair Jerome H. Powell and Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin to lower the eligibility for a key coronavirus economic recovery program to reach devastated communities in more cities.

“The novel coronavirus pandemic is generating massive, unprecedented economic disruption for families and businesses throughout the country, in some ways worse than what we experienced during the Great Depression,” National Urban League President and CEO Marc H. Morial wrote in a letter to Powell and Mnuchin, noting that cities with significant African-American and minority populations were excluded from direct grants or not fully funded under the CARES Act, including Charlotte, Memphis, Austin, and Milwaukee. 

Last week, the Federal Reserve announced a Municipal Liquidity Facility (MLF) that will offer up to $500 billion in lending to states, cities and counties, but the cities excluded from CARES funding are also not eligible for MLF funding. Atlanta, Baltimore, New Orleans, and Detroit similarly are excluded from participating in the MLF.

“Given the debilitating impacts these jurisdictions are experiencing with COVID-19, the Fed and Treasury should not compound Congress’s error by creating an even smaller group of cities that can access the MLF,’ Morial wrote. These smaller cities typically have a more narrow economic base than larger areas, have weaker infrastructure, and grossly inadequate health care facilities. Also, such communities lagged in recovering from the impact of the Great Recession. They are desperately in need of liquidity to help cope with the broad economic disruption imposed by COVID-19.”

Morial called for the borrowing threshold for the MLF to be lowered to include local governments with a population of at least 100,000.

The National Urban League and its network of 90 affiliates have responded to the coronavirus crisis with an advocacy and service campaign, The Urban League Fights For You. For more information, visit www.nul.org