WARREN — City council is expected to receive by mid-September a final report on the $31 million worth of requests from 52 community organizations seeking American Rescue Plan funds.

The city received $28.6 million in ARP funds and already committed more than $4 million in city projects, and is in the midst of discussions on providing additional money to various city departments plus project requests from council members.

Safety Service Director Eddie Colbert told council the city will be sending questions back to the 52 community organizations that are applying for ARP grants to obtain detailed information about their proposals.

Colbert emphasized that the committee reviewing the applications does not see how some community group proposals fit criteria required by the federal government that will allow them to receive the funds. This is a second opportunity to clarify their proposals and better explain the projects.

Economic Action Group’s Nick Chretien told council it will take approximately three weeks for the requests for information to be returned to the city and another three weeks for them to be analyzed and vetted.

The Economic Action Group is a Youngstown-based organization hired by the city to help it review and analyze all ARP requests.

It will be after that time that the administration will submit the information to city council for it to determine which proposals to fund.

Councilman Todd Johnson, I-1st Ward, emphasized it is difficult to make decisions about spending the money because council has not been getting the whole story about spending,including all of the requests from city departments as well as the community proposals.

Johnson emphasized the city would have been looking at ways to pay for some items being requested by departments even if the ARP funds had not come into existence.

“We should be looking at the entire picture,” he said. “We do not have the whole picture. We are not in a fair position to make decisions about spending.”

Councilwoman Helen Rucker, D-at Large, added council in making these decisions has to look how these ARP choices will impact the city’s general fund budget over the next several years.

Councilman Andrew Herman, D-2nd Ward, emphasized officials must keep in mind that the ARP funds will not come again and their use should be transformational.

“I do not believe purchasing of snow plows is transformational,” Herman said.

Council has approved using part of the ARP funds to buy five snow plows.

The city police department once again will review its requests to provide ARP funds for police equipment during a meeting at 4 p.m. today, in council’s caucus chamber. Officials also will discuss the purchase of a new fire truck through the use of a bond.

Council is scheduled to vote on $1 million to Trumbull Neighborhood Partnership’s emergency home repair program.

It also will be voting to provide $1 million for the 25 percent local match needed for a $4 million state grant for demolition projects that will be done by the Trumbull Land Bank.

It will vote to provide $500,000 for a local match of a $2 million grant for the remediation of the Warren gasification plant, which also will go to the Trumbull Land Bank.

Rucker emphasized there is no rush for council to approved any of the requests being made for the ARP funding, because there is not immediate deadlines to be met.