A nearly $500,000 federal grant the Franklin School District used to fund mental health and social services was revoked by the Department of Homeland Security because it purportedly failed to align with its goals, according to a letter received by district officials.
The announcement, which came midway through the two-year grant period, stripped the district of $240,000 that would have been used to train teachers on youth mental health and run a summer institute, both of which have been canceled, said Superintendent Dan LeGallo.
In its first award year, Franklin Schools used the grant, a part of the Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention Grant Program, to cover a portion of the salaries for the district’s school wellness coordinator, attendance and family liaison and the high school’s climate specialist.
The notification came a week after the $20 million budget for the upcoming school year had been approved.
“We are disappointed,” LeGallo said. “We’ve been working hard to make sure we can fund the employees in other ways, because it’s really important that we have those positions in our district.”
The wellness coordinator supervises mental health professionals, guidance counselors and the climate specialist. That role evaluates the social and academic needs of students. The attendance and family liaison works with families and students to lower truancy and tardiness rates. LeGallo said all three schools hit a 90% attendance rate for the first time in 10 years.
In a joint finance committee meeting Tuesday night, LeGallo said the funds would be “repurposed” from three open positions, including an assistant principal at the high school, a secretary and an industrial arts teacher at the middle school.
In a July 17 announcement, DHS stated it canceled $18.5 million grants in “misappropriated spending” at the Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships for not meeting the goals to prevent terrorism or targeted violence. The program “had become a cash cow for radical activists under the Biden Administration—funneling taxpayer dollars to push woke, partisan agendas and silencing dissent,” the department said. “After a strategic review, DHS is discontinuing the funding of grants that have no legitimate nexus to protecting the homeland from the threat of terrorism.”
LeGallo had some choice words for the federal officials who decided to revoke the grant.
“I would tell them to come spend the day with us in our district and see some of the challenges our students face before making the judgment about whether or not that money was being put to good use,” LeGallo said.
Franklin Schools was the first organization in New Hampshire to receive the grant as it has one of the most poorly-funded school districts in the state.
In the Tuesday meeting, Michael Lombardo, chair of the School Board Finance Committee, said Franklin ranks the fifth-lowest in the state for the proportion of local taxes going to education, with 35% of taxpayer dollars going to schools and 65% going to other city and county services.
“That has been historically the case here,” Lombardo said. “We, in all honesty, need to move up on that list.”
LeGallo said in the committee meeting that it anticipates other budget shortfalls due to the decrease of families who qualify for the free and reduced lunch program and the rising costs of special education resources. The school has also cut 37 and a half positions in the last two years.
“We haven’t asked for anything,” LeGallo said in the meeting. “We’ve been giving and giving.”
