The budgets of four nonprofits tasked with preventing and alleviating poverty in Hawaii could be slashed under President Donald Trump’s 2018 budget outline for discretionary spending released Thursday, placing increased financial pressure on the state to fund social service programs, while jeopardizing the jobs of more than 600 people who are employed at the agencies throughout the islands.
The Honolulu Community Action Program, Maui Economic Opportunity, Kauai Economic Opportunity and Hawaii County Economic Opportunity Council are among about 1,000 Community Action Agencies throughout the country that grew out of the 1960s War on Poverty.
The agencies were established under President Lyndon Johnson’s Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 to “eliminate the paradox of poverty in the midst of plenty” by creating job opportunities.
But several funding streams for the agencies are on the chopping block as part of Trump’s blueprint for cutting government waste and inefficiencies, while increasing military spending.
“These entities that have helped people, especially in rural areas, they could potentially suffer major cuts if not have their program completely eliminated,” said U.S. Rep. Colleen Hanabusa, who along with other members of Hawaii’s congressional delegation has said she will fight many of the cuts when the president’s budget goes to Congress.
Under Trump’s proposals, about $4.2 billion in Community Services Block Grants — which provide base funding for the Community Action Agencies — would be eliminated.
The CSBG program funds “services that are duplicative of other federal programs, such as emergency food assistance and employment services, and is also a limited-impact program,” according to Trump’s budget.
For Hawaii this would amount to a loss of about $3.7 million annually that supports the nonprofit agencies. Directors of the anti-poverty centers say that CSBG funding is critical to supporting basic operations and helping attract additional funding sources.
“CSBG money is like our glue money. It was set up to help us then be able to get other funding,” explained Mabel Ferreiro-Fuji- uchi, CEO of Kauai Economic Opportunity.
The CSBG funding makes up as little as 2.5 percent of the budget for Maui Economic Opportunity and as much as 25 percent of the budget for the Hawaii County Economic Opportunity Council. The funding comprises about 7 percent for Kauai’s program and 10 percent of Oahu’s.
“It’s hard to put into words,” said Jay Kimura, executive director of the Hawaii County Economic Opportunity Council, when asked about the impact of the cuts. “It doesn’t take into account the needs of seniors, the disabled, those that are going to be forced to choose between eating or heating their house or turning on their lights.”
Other funding at risk
The nonprofits provide varied services based on the needs of their communities, such as job training, assistance with utility bills, shelter for the homeless, transportation for low-income seniors and after-school care for kids.
For Kimura, just the loss in CSBG funding would have a major impact on his organization. But there are also other streams of federal funding that the agencies rely upon to fund serv-ices that Trump has proposed eliminating, including the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, the Senior Community Service Improvement Program, the Weatherization Assistance Program, AmeriCorps and Head Start.
For the Honolulu Community Action Program, the combined losses could nearly deplete its approximately $20 million budget, according to Corinne Murashige, the agency’s director of finance.
“That’s pretty much everything we have,” she said, noting that the grants make up about $18 million of its budget. “I just find it very ironic that they are contemplating cutting the programs that are really trying to get people out of poverty so they are not so dependent on government,” Murashige said.
She said she didn’t believe the agencies’ services repeated other government programs, as Trump has suggested.
“I would like him to explain where it is duplicative, because if it is let’s go for the other funding,” she said. “Show us where the money is.”
Shelter shutdowns
Maui Economic Opportunity also depends on several other streams of federal funding, aside from CSBG funds, that could be cut, totaling about 20 percent of its $17 million budget.
Ferreiro-Fujiuchi said that if the funding cuts were to eventually be enacted, her program on Kauai may have to shut down its 38-bed homeless shelter, which is the only shelter on the island, as well as 21 apartments that serve as transitional housing for the homeless.
She said she wasn’t panicking yet, noting that she has been through proposed budget cuts several times in the past. She noted that former President Barack Obama also sought to eliminate CSBG funding but that members of Congress put it back in the budget.
Members of the Trump administration have been defending the president’s budget since Thursday against criticism that it cuts too deeply into certain departments and programs, including services for the poor.
Refocusing funds
White House budget chief Mick Mulvaney told reporters during a press briefing in Washington, D.C., that the budget seeks to use taxpayer money only on programs proven to work.
“You’re focusing on recipients of the money. We’re focusing on recipients of the money and people who give us the money in the first place,” he said in response to a reporter’s question about whether cuts to programs like Head Start and meals for low-income seniors lacked compassion. “I think it’s fairly compassionate to go to them and say, ‘Look, we’re not going to ask you for your hard-earned money anymore.‘ Single mom of two in Detroit, OK, ‘Give us your money!’ We’re not going to do that anymore … unless we can guarantee that money will be used in a proper function.”
But Lyn McNeff, CEO of Maui Economic Opportunity, said the cuts to funding for her agency’s programs, as well as many other deep cuts that the Trump administration has proposed for programs dealing with health and human services, would have far-reaching impacts on those living in poverty or with low incomes.
“It would be devastating for the community. Their safety net would be gone,” McNeff said.
