Federal Grants and the State of Florida – A Spending Deficit
The following guest blog article
was written by David Lipten, Ph.D., owner/consultant at GrantWorks
(www.grantworksonline.com). His article on writing winning federal grant
proposals is an encouraging piece for novice grant writers first stepping into
the grant writing world.
In 2010, the state of Florida received some
of the most generous funding amounts of any
state from the federal government in the form of direct expenditures, including
grant support, as it has for quite some time. But, it never seems to be enough
(in spite of the many calls for cuts to federal spending coming from state
politicians, including many of Florida’s). Its citizens are repeatedly told
that there isn’t enough money for things like education, infrastructure,
housing, etc.
Why should this be the case if, as reported
by the U.S. Census Bureau, Florida received $187 billion in federal support,
the fourth most of any state? In
fact, Florida enjoyed the 5th highest amount of grant support given
to any of the fifty states for Health and Human Services, the 4th
most for Education, 5th most for Transportation, 6th for
Housing and Urban Development, 4th for Agriculture, and 5th most
for Homeland Security. Per capita, the federal government spent $9,930 on Floridians
in 2010, third most in the U.S. But, Florida itself is ranked 48th in
spending on a per capita basis with expenditures of its federal grants proceeds
consistently well below the respective national average on a per capita basis. This
is true even while such spending increased from $586 in 1996 to $1475 in 2010. These
expenditures amounted to $507 less than the national average in 2010 in spite
of the fact that Florida was on the receiving end of the 4th largest
amount of all federal grants expended in the country in 2010 (or $27.7 billion).
The preceding begs some important questions,
then, namely, why is there such low per capita spending from all of the federal
grants received? Why isn’t Florida receiving more grants to support the needs
of its population? Also, where is all the money that the state has received going,
and where are all the services and benefits that the money is supposed to be
providing?
The first question may be somewhat easier to
answer. First, funding formulas are often based on outdated population figures
that don’t reflect Florida’s growth in recent years. They are also difficult to revise since smaller states lobby
hard to keep them where they are as they stand to lose support if the formulas
are, indeed, updated (there are echoes of the reasons cited by the Supreme
Court for striking down a provision of the Voting Rights Act here).
As to the second question, again, while
Florida has been successful to a point in procuring funding (again $27.7
billion received), the state may not have been as aggressive as it could have
in going after all of the federal grant opportunities available to it. In fact,
Florida was still $8.1 billion short if one takes into account the state’s
population. In other words, Florida should have received something closer to
$35.8 billion in grant support.
To be fair, there may also be a dearth of
matching funds and there may be onerous federal requirements that limit the
receipt of grant funding. But, I’m not sure that these conditions would
necessarily account for such a large gap.
I do not have an answer to the third question
(i.e., where is all the money going?). I do know, though, that it is a shame
and that Florida officials ought to be questioned on this and held accountable
(something increasingly difficult to do when there is so much political
obfuscation). That said, there are steps to take that might help close the gap.
In fact, the Florida Legislative Committee on Intergovernmental Relations made
a number of recommendations in 2008 that local governments undertake a number
of practices to, at least, improve Florida’s grant seeking abilities. Among
other things, they called for:
·
Collaboration between local
governments and regional entities to explore meeting eligibility requirements
for certain grants
·
Determining whether full
advantage of grant opportunities is being taken by these entities by comparing
their efforts with neighboring or similarly situated local governments
·
Developing direct rapport with
personnel from granting agencies once suitable grants have been identified
·
Identifying federal and state
policy changes needed to enhance Florida’s access to federal funding streams
·
Supporting state efforts to form
coalitions with similarly situated states to pursue changes in outdated or
inequitable federal formulas
·
Working to implement changes to
federal formulas determined to be outdated or inequitable
·
Pursuing increased availability
of state matching funds or other locally available funds
·
Investing in training provided at
the state and local levels for accessing federal and state grant funding
·
Increasing communication and
coordination on federal funding issues among state agencies, the Governor’s
office, the Florida Washington office, the Legislature and the Congressional
delegation
·
Enlisting the assistance from
Congressional offices to provide letters of support when competing with local
governments from other states
And, importantly,
from my perspective
·
Conducting cost-benefit analyses
to assess the fiscal value of hiring one or more grant writers (something that
I discussed in a previous blog entry, “What’s the ROI of a Grant Writer”).
Of course, the preceding recommendations,
while seemingly helpful, may or may not help close the gap between funding
received and what’s needed. I would like to see the state address these issues.
What do you think will help?
David Lipten, Ph.D
Owner/Consultant
GrantWorks
850 590-8087
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