Public safety groups face an uncertain future months after federal grant cuts : NPR

Six months after the abolition of the Ministry of Justice over 800 million dollars With federal grant money, many groups receiving assistance are still reeling.

Cuts to public safety initiatives affected hundreds of organizations across the country and had far-reaching effects: anti-violence programs in schools, rural police training, resources for domestic violence victims and hate crime prevention.

At the time, Attorney General Pam Bondi said the department cut millions of dollars in “wasteful grants” while emphasizing efforts to support transgender and LGBT communities.

NPR spoke with 10 affected organizations to find out how they're doing. Some said their grants had been renewed, but most said they had to lay off staff, use emergency funds or reduce the services they offered.

“These cuts are significant and unprecedented,” says Amy Solomon, a senior fellow at the Criminal Justice Council and former director of the Justice Department's Office of Justice Programs, the office responsible for the cuts.

“When the administration gives an organization a grant, it means a promise to receive the full amount. And so organizations plan, budget, hire,” she says.

Instead, the Department of Justice canceled these grants mid-cycle.

At Washington Tech High School in St. Paul, Minn., Principal Elias Oguz was shocked when his school unexpectedly cut a grant-funded position last spring.

“The grant was called Stop the Violence,” he says. “Who would want to cut the Stop the Violence grant?”

The money allowed him to hire Robyn Strauder as a restorative coordinator to resolve conflicts between students and build community at the school.

“It was very nerve-wracking,” Strawder says. “There was definitely a point where I thought, 'Hey, I have a whole family to support and I'm not sure if I have a job.'

Oguz ultimately contributed $50,000 to the position, using money allocated for school supplies, as well as other school district funds and community donations. Despite this, he is not sure where the money will come from in the future.

Oguz and Strawder aren't the only ones facing this uncertainty.

“We have three other federal grants and we know they can be terminated at any time without cause. If that happens, we'll have to lay off staff and stop services for members,” Niki Fadley, executive director of the Virginia-based nonprofit Strength In Peers, told NPR.

An organization that supports people with substance use and mental health problems has already laid off two staff. It has already spent about $90,000 of the terminated grant and is still awaiting reimbursement of more than half of that amount.

Many organizations NPR spoke with found themselves in a similar situation, saying the Justice Department had not reimbursed them for money they had already spent. Those who appealed the cancellation received no response. Several organizations filed a lawsuit against the administrationclaiming that the cancellation was illegal and that they were owed thousands of dollars in outstanding expenses.

In a statement, the Justice Department told NPR that the ongoing government shutdown is limiting its ability to hear appeals and reimburse organizations. However, the department canceled the grants five months before the shutdown began.

Almost all of the cuts affected non-profit organizations. Solomon, the former Justice Department official, says it shows how the Trump administration thinks about public safety.

“The old school view is that only the police can keep communities safe. And what we're seeing more and more on the ground is community organizations working as a complement to law enforcement,” she says.

In fact, after the grants were cancelled, Justice Department officials sent a letter Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, emphasizing that the cuts primarily affected nonprofit organizations and “not states or local jurisdictions that directly serve our communities.”

“It's a flawed rationale because these organizations play a really important role in their communities,” Solomon says.

“We've been hit hard,” says Everett Penn, co-founder and former director of the Teen and Policing Academy, a mentoring program in Houston that has had to cut staff. He says federal grant funding has supported the nonprofit world for years.

“It's the public sector that funds things that often aren't funded in the private sector, because they're necessary to keep our society functioning,” he says.

Dwight Robeson, executive vice president of operations for the anti-community violence group Roca, said the Justice Department has told his organization that its work “no longer impacts” the administration's priorities. However, Robson says combating violent crime and protecting children were among the Justice Department's new priorities in its communications with his organization.

“We think this is something we do very, very well. We don't think we qualify for any funding. We are very happy to undergo any individual merit-based assessment of our work,” says Robson. “We believe that such a study would lead to the conclusion that there is, in fact, a very good fit between the priorities of the Department of Justice and our work.”

Roca had to eliminate about 50 positions, Robson said. They are now looking for other sources of funding. He says Roca is up to the task, but he worries about the future of other public safety groups.

“I'm sure there are funders who look at organizations and say, 'Boy, they're doing a good job,'” he says. “But it's unclear whether they'll be there in two or three, four, five years.”