For Congressman Chris Pappas, public service has always been about finding ways to give back to the community that has given him so much. A lifelong resident of Manchester, New Hampshire, Chris was born into a proud Greek-American family. After graduating from Harvard, Chris returned home where he began a career in public service while helping run the 105 year-old family restaurant where he started scooping ice cream and bussing tables at age 14.
In Congress, Chris focuses on the issues that matter most to Granite Staters, including improving access to health care, lowering the high cost of prescription drugs, combating the addiction epidemic, and protecting our environment and drinking water.
If you need assistance with programs included in the American Rescue Plan or previous COVID-19 relief legislation - including Economic Impact Payments and the Paycheck Protection Program - contact Congressman Pappas's office at (603) 285-4300 or email us here.
The American Rescue Plan provides direct assistance to families, invests in vaccine distribution, ensures schools have the resources to resume in-person learning safely, and supports small businesses. This package will finally help us defeat this virus, and help Granite Staters who have lost so much rebuild and move forward.
An average family will receive a $3,000 tax cut from the American Rescue Plan, with most relief going to low - and middle-income homes.
Individuals earning $91,000 or less will receive 70% of the tax benefits in this package
The poorest 20% of Americans will see a 20% boost in their income as a result of the American Rescue Plan.
The American Rescue Plan will deliver immediate relief to working families who are bearing the brunt of this crisis by:
Providing $1,400 direct payments for those making under $75,000 a year
597,274 Granite Staters will receive stimulus checks totaling more than $1.5 billion in direct relief to New Hampshire families.
Making the child tax credit fully refundable and increases the size of the credit from $2,000 per child to $3,000 ($3,600 for each child under age 6). This will allow the parents of 27 million children who currently don’t earn enough to receive the full value of the tax credit.
Experts estimate this policy will cut the child poverty rate in half.
This will lift 8,000 New Hampshire children out of poverty and provide tax relief to the families of 220,000 New Hampshire children.
Extending unemployment benefits which are currently set to expire on Sunday through September 6, including a supplemental $300 per week.
This will provide struggling Granite Staters $17 million per week through Labor Day.
Exempting up to $10,200 in unemployment benefits received in 2020 from federal income taxes for households earning less than $150,000
Expanding Pandemic Unemployment Assistance Program for individuals who don’t qualify for regular state unemployment benefits and Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation for those individuals who have exhausted their normal benefits. Both programs will be extended through September 6.
Expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit for childless adults from $530 to $1,500 and raising the income limit for those eligible from $16,000 to $21,000.
70,000 New Hampshire workers will benefit from this change.
The American Rescue plan will mount a national vaccination plan to set up community vaccinating sites nationwide and take measures to combat the virus, including testing, tracing, and addressing the shortages of PPE by:
Providing over $20 billion to establish a national COVID-19 vaccination program and improve the administration and distribution of vaccinations, including:
$7.5 billion for the CDC to prepare, promote, distribute, administer, monitor, and track COVID-19 vaccines.
$7.5 billion for FEMA to establish vaccination sites across the country.
Requiring coverage of COVID-19 vaccines and treatments in the Medicaid program at zero cost-sharing and increase the FMAP to 100 percent for vaccine administration through one year after the end of the PHE
Allocating $51 billion to expand testing, contact tracing, and mitigation and related Activities
Funding the Defense Production Act to close the gap in domestic manufacturing to fulfill U.S. public health needs.
Specifically, the bill provides $10 billion to boost domestic production of critical PPE, secure supply chains and increased capacity for vital vaccine production and to help onshore production of rapid COVID-19 tests.
The American Rescue Plan makes necessary investments to safely re-open schools, support higher education, and aid schools and libraries which have been essential to hybrid and remote learning by:
Providing $130 billion to states and school districts for immediate and long-term relief so they can work with public health experts to safely re-open schools and make up for lost time in the classroom. This includes:
$350 million for New Hampshire public schools.
Repairing ventilation systems, reducing class sizes and implementing social distancing guidelines, purchasing personal protective equipment, and hiring support staff to care for students’ health and well-being.
Ensuring 20 percent of the funding that schools receive must be reserved to address and remediate learning loss among students.
Requiring states to award K-12 funds to local school districts no later than 60 days after receipt and school districts to develop plans that ensure schools return to in person learning
Dedicating $800 million to help meet the needs of homeless young people;
Funding evidence-based summer enrichment at $1.3 billion and afterschool support initiatives also at $1.3 billion;
Allocating $3 billion for Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA);
Directing $40 billion to institutions of higher education to help make up for lost revenue due to the pandemic. Requires institutions to dedicate at least half of their funding for emergency financial aid grants to students to help prevent hunger, homelessness and other hardships facing students as a result of the pandemic.
Giving an additional $7.1 billion to reimburse schools and libraries – central points for connectivity in many communities – to purchase equipment such as hotspots, internet service, and computers on behalf of students and patrons. This equipment is essential for homework when in-person classes resume, as well as for hybrid and remote learning.
The American Rescue Plan significantly expands subsidies in the ACA Marketplace and makes health care coverage more affordable for middle-class families by:
Expanding the subsidies in the ACA Marketplaces to cover more middle class families and to be more generous for those already receiving them, for 2021 and 2022.
Specifically, it removes the current cap that makes any family with income above 400% of the poverty level ineligible for any subsidies.
Under the bill, no one will have to pay more than 8.5 percent of their income for a silver plan in the ACA marketplaces.
It also provides that individuals below 150% of the poverty level pay no premiums at all compared to 4% of their income currently.
The average New Hampshire family will see their premiums decrease by $291 per month.
Ensuring that any individual who receives unemployment at any point in 2021 is treated as if their income were 133% of the poverty level for the purposes of the ACA marketplace subsidy. As a result, they can purchase an ACA silver plan for zero premium.
Helping individuals who lose their job and choose to use COBRA to continue their existing employer-sponsored health coverage by providing a 100% subsidy.
Currently, those who would like to choose COBRA are required to pay the full cost of their coverage, including the employer
Providing $4 billion to expand behavioral and mental health services
Providing significant funding to address health disparities and protect vulnerable populations
Mobilizing a public health jobs program to support the COVID-19 response to hire an additional 100,000 full-time employees into the public health workforce
The American Rescue Plan provides support to individuals struggling to pay their rent, keep their lights on, and feed their families by:
Providing $27.5 billion for Emergency Rental Assistance, to help ensure struggling families continue to have a safe place to live during this pandemic
New Hampshire will receive $152 million in emergency assistance.
Providing $10 billion to help homeowners struggling to afford their housing as a result of the pandemic
Allocating $4.75 billion to state and local governments to work on homelessness
$5 billion to help those in need pay utility bills
Extending SNAP maximum benefits by 15 percent (through September 30, 2021)
Maintaining and expanding the Pandemic-EBT (P-EBT) Program and investing more than $5 billion in P-EBT so that low-income families have access to school meals and food assistance during both the school year and summer months
Expanding access to the USDA’s Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) at emergency homeless shelters to ensure more young adults can access needed nutrition support.
The American Rescue takes significant steps to support small businesses owners and non-profits as they continue to recover from the economic crisis by:
Providing an additional $7.25 billion for the Paycheck Protection Program and expanding eligibility to include non-profits of all sizes and types, except for 501(c)4 lobbying organizations
Creating a Restaurant Revitalization fund with $28.66 billion to offer assistance to restaurants and bars impacted by the pandemic.
Providing an additional $15 billion for targeted EIDL Advances to help those who applied for relief in 2020 but did not receive the full grant.
Extending the Employee Retention Tax Credit to start-up businesses who were not in existence in 201
The American Rescue Plan provides direct support to states and localities to help keep critical workers on the job by:
Provides $350 billion for new Coronavirus Relief Funds for states, localities, the U.S. Territories, and the Tribal Governments including
Creating a $10 billion Capital Project Fund to carry out critical capital projects directly enabling work, education, and health monitoring, including remote options, in response to the public health emergency
The American Rescue Plan makes key investments for veterans and servicemembers impacted by the pandemic by:
Ensuring veterans will not have any copays or cost-sharing for preventative treatment or services related to COVID-19 going back to April 2020 and authorizes the VA to reimburse those veterans who already submitted payments for their care during this period.
Including more than $14.5 billion for VA to provide health care services and other related supports – including suicide prevention, Women’s health services, telehealth expansion, medical facility improvements – to eligible veterans and allows up to $4 billion in spending for the Veterans Community Care Program.
Providing nearly $400 million for up to 12 months of retraining assistance for veterans who are unemployed as a result of the pandemic and do not have access to other veteran education benefits. This funding covers the cost of the rapid retraining program as well as a housing allowance for enrolled veterans.
Including $272 million for the VA to mitigate the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the benefits claims and appeals backlog.
Providing emergency paid sick leave for VA’s frontline and essential health workers.
The American Rescue Plan bolsters our countries child care system and increases accessibility for working families by:
Providing $39 billion to child care providers to help them safely re-open and provide financial relief for families struggling to cover tuition
This includes $367 million in new childcare funding for New Hampshire.
Improving the Child and Dependent Tax Credit by doubling the amount of child and dependent care expenses eligible for the credit up to $8,000 for one qualifying individual and $16,000 for two or more
Increasing the annual funding level for child care entitlement to states from $2.9 billion to $3.5 billion
Helping Head Start programs with an additional $1 billion to equip facilities to safely stay open and hire more staff