Erie County Executive Brenton Davis is ordering two organizations to return all of the unspent money that they received from the county, through the American Rescue Plan.

Davis recently sent letters to the Erie County Gaming Revenue Authority (ECGRA) and the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Commission (DEI) informing them of his decision.

Since the pandemic, ECGRA has received a total of $4 million in ARP funds, while the DEI Commission received $3.5 million.

The money is meant to offset the negative economic impacts of COVID, by providing businesses and non-profits with grants.

However, according to Davis, both organizations have not properly reported how the funds have been used.

"What we have is ECGRA and the Diverse Erie Commission are both way out of compliance in terms of reporting, there are things that have no reports," said Davis. "At this point, they've both indicated that the remaining dollars from the previous administration allocation of both organizations, they both wanted to use them for salaries or operating costs, or contracting costs. To me, that's not what this money is meant for. We're not meant to keep offices open, to pay people's salaries to do those things. This money was meant to benefit the taxpayers and the residents of Erie County who were adversely affected not just by COVID, but to improve their lives moving forward."

Davis is ordering the organizations to return the remaining money they've been awarded by December 16, which includes $475,000 from the DEI Commission, and $329,000 from ECGRA.

Erie News Now reached out to ECGRA's and the DEI Commission's solicitor Tim Wachter for comment, but we have not heard back from him.