More than $22 million is coming to three county colleges and universities through the COVID-19 relief plan that was recently approved.

Overall, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer announced that the recently-signed American Rescue Plan includes an estimated $2.6 billion for New York’s public, private, and proprietary institutions of higher education.

Locally, the State University of New York at Fredonia will receive $14.42 million; Jamestown Community College will receive close to $8.1 million; and Jamestown Business College will get $163,000.

Schumer said that public and non-profit schools will use half of their award on emergency financial aid grants to students to help them with college costs and basic needs like housing, food, and healthcare. The other half of the funds will allow institutions to provide additional student support activities, and to cover a variety of institutional costs, including lost revenue, reimbursement for expenses already incurred, technology costs associated with a transition to distance education, faculty and staff trainings, and payroll. Proprietary schools must use their awards exclusively to provide financial aid grants to students.

“As New York’s colleges, universities, and students face over a year of unprecedented hurdles, they do so at a steep cost that it is our responsibility to address and overcome. In prioritizing the health and safety of students, faculty, and staff, New York’s higher education institutions have ripped massive holes in their budgets and are now facing down financial devastation – and we simply can’t let that happen,” said Schumer. “As Majority Leader, I was proud to make funding for New York’s higher education institutions and students a top priority, and the American Rescue Plan will deliver this much needed $2.6 billion in assistance to help our world-class institutions through the crisis, get students safely back to classes, and get campuses across the state back to ‘normal’.”

This funding announced is in addition to the $2.4 billion Schumer secured for New York’s institutions of higher education in the past COVID relief bills. In total, Schumer has secured over $5 billion for New York’s colleges and universities in the past year.