The Schuylkill County Commissioners approved a $2 million cash advance to the Children and Youth Agency.

Last week, Finance Director Paul Buber said the money is coming from the general fund.

“Currently the agency is experiencing a cash squeeze because of delay in receiving their reimbursements from federal and state and they have already maxed out on the amount that has been approved in terms of an allocation from the general fund of the $4.9 million. So therefore they do have bills down there and the bills do have to be paid,” Buber said.

The agency budget is about $28.5 million. Of that, $23.6 is combined federal and state monies.

Buber said the agency expects they will be able to repay the money.

The American Rescue Plan Act funds expended were also discussed. A budget adjustment of $517,000 was listed on the agenda. Buber said the Treasury Department provided additional guidance on how to designate accounts and the accounting of such funds. New accounts were created to comply with the required guidance from the treasury.

To date, the county has received approximately $13 million of the $27,415,708 from the federal government. Commissioners’ Chairman Barron “Boots” Hetherington said the commissioners have a list of projects totaling about $50 million.

Buber said as of Sept. 30 the county spent about $46,000. Of that, about $38,000 is for professional services and about $8,000 is for the public health category in relation to air purifiers the county bought for the county buildings because of the COVID-19 pandemic. What those professional services were was not mentioned.

“We’re trying to be prudent and responsible in how we go about doing this,” Hetherington said on spending the money.