Chautauqua County health officials are praising a $2 million grant awarded to the county.

In mid-January, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced that it was awarding nearly $104.7 million to 60 non-profit organizations, and state and local government agencies located in 29 states to protect children and families from home health hazards.

Local recipients included Chautauqua County for $2 million and $1.6 million to the Seneca Nation of Indians. Both agencies were predicted to be able to improve 80 homes each.

During the recent Board of Health meeting, Dr. Lilian Ney praised the announcement. “I just can’t help mention how excited I am about this,” she said.

Bill Boria with the county Health Department said they are partnering with a number of other organizations as well as the city of Jamestown.

Boria said in the past HUD would issue the grants to deal with lead-based paint, but other problems weren’t able to be addressed. “Our lead inspectors are going into houses and some of them are very old and to be honest, for some of them, lead is the least of their problems,” he said.

There were times inspectors would find leaky roofs, mold, bed bugs, cockroaches and other bug infestations but there was little they could do. “They would do some painting, some cleaning, some education, but that was it,” he said.

According to Boria, this grant will pay for remediation of the entire home, instead of only addressing lead. “This is going to make a big difference,” he said.

Boria said the grant is for three years and they hope to be able to start work in a month or two.

The grant requires the homes have children under 18 or have senior citizens and be for residents with lower or moderate income levels.

Board member Dr. Tariq Khan said he hopes the grant will be able to be used for working people. “When I hear about young individuals, young professionals who are looking to buy property, and they’re making $60,000 to $70,000 and the house has all kinds of environmental issues, I hope there are some avenues in this grant that those young, working folks who just can’t afford $6,000, $9,000, $10,000 for remediation, can get some help,” he said.

Ney said she also hopes the grant will reduce childhood asthma. “A lot of the things they’re going to remediate are probably direct causes or at least very involved in asthma,” she said.

Breeanne Agett with the county Health Department agreed. “With the housing conditions in the city of Jamestown, these problems that Bill (Boria) mentioned, if we can start to address those and really tackle them we have great capacity to truly affect the social determinants of health and improve population health in Chautauqua County,” she said.

In the announcement, Stephen Murphy, HUD Deputy Regional Administrator for New York and New Jersey said, “Health and housing go hand-in-hand, and HUD will continue to invest in the health of children and families in New York that need it most.