Speakers at the June 5 public hearing on Cumberland County’s fiscal year 2024-25 budget did not hold back in their requests for funds.
“We are facing a critical challenge,” said Renee Lane, executive director of the Airborne and Special Operations Museum Foundation. “A tragic and fatal car accident led to the theater’s closure in February 2023, and in November the (Pritzker) Motion Simulator was discontinued after 23 years. Cost-cutting measures included a hiring freeze, reduced hours for our sales staff, and restricted advertising spending.”
This year, the foundation will not receive any funding from the district, as will four other non-profit organizations that had already applied for funding but were rejected.
Why? County Manager Clarence Grier declined CityView’s request for comment and Chairman Glenn Adams declined to answer specific questions from CityView.
Instead, Adams issued this statement via email: “The Cumberland County Board of Commissioners is extremely proud of the budget it has prepared for the citizens of Cumberland County. As always, there are difficult funding decisions in each fiscal year. The Commissioners are incredibly pleased that the County Manager recommended the budget without a property tax increase and that we were able to approve it. The approved budget allows the County to continue to provide excellent services to the citizens while advancing the Board’s priorities.”
Here’s what we found out about the county’s funding decisions for nonprofits:
Who got what?
According to the recommended budget for fiscal year 2024-25 and a county press release, the following nonprofits will receive funding:
- The Arts Council of Fayetteville/Cumberland County, $35,000
- Boys & Girls Club, $10,000
- Cape Fear Botanical Garden, $5,646
- Cape Fear Regional Office of Community Action, $10,328
- Cape Fear River Gathering, $9,923
- Child Protection Center, $1,000
- Cumberland County Older Adult Coordinating Council, $100,215
- Cumberland County Veterans Council, $7,000
- HIV Task Force, $5,081
- United Way 211, $5,500
- Vision Resource Center, $15,000
Five nonprofits — the Airborne and Special Operations Museum Foundation, the North Carolina Symphony Society, the Partnership for Children of Cumberland County, the Salvation Army and the Second Harvest Food Bank of Southeast NC — applied to the county for funds but received none.
According to a CityView analysis, four nonprofits – the Cape Fear Regional Bureau for Community Action, the Cape Fear River Assembly, the HIV Task Force and the Vision Resource Center – received exactly the amount of funding they requested.
Of all the nonprofits that received funding, seven received less money than they requested, and no nonprofit received more money than they requested, the analysis shows.
Of the $204,693 earmarked for nonprofits in the county’s 2024-25 fiscal year, the Cumberland County Coordinating Council On Older Adults received the lion’s share, with nearly 49% of the funds disbursed. The Arts Council came in second, with 17%, and the Vision Resource Center received the third-largest share of funds, with 7.3%, according to CityView’s analysis.
The recommended budget states that the Airborne & Special Operations Museum Foundation, Child Advocacy Center and Second Harvest Food Bank of Southeast NC did not receive funds because they already received funds from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA). Cumberland County received $65 million in ARPA funds as part of a $1.9 trillion federal stimulus package that President Joe Biden signed in 2021 to spur economic recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic.
CityView previously reported that the board’s ARPA committee approved a $25,000 grant to the Airborne & Special Operations Museum Foundation and a $41,368 grant to the Child Advocacy Center in April.
“For budgetary reasons, new financing is not recommended,” the draft budget states.
“We try to do our best”
Although Grier declined to provide insight into the decision-making process, two county commissioners told CityView that it is often difficult.
Toni Stewart, commissioner and vice chair of the board, said county staff largely determines which nonprofits receive funding and how much each receives. The board only intervenes when commissioners have questions or concerns.
“We’re just concerned with balancing the budget and making sure we’re doing the right thing with people’s money,” Stewart said.
Commissioner Michael Boose said no nonprofit is guaranteed funding in a given year.
“We try to do our best,” Boose said.
Boose, who himself served on the Boys and Girls Club board, said he understands the frustration that can arise among nonprofits when they see a less established organization receiving funding from the county.
Boose praised Grier, a certified public accountant, for his critical eye in examining nonprofits’ finances, but said he would like to see clearer and stricter guidelines for the funding process at the county level.
“We don’t have a uniform report. We don’t have a uniform criteria,” he said. “We have no obligation to tell us what they did with the money.”
Stewart said the board has adopted a rule that nonprofits cannot simultaneously receive money from ARPA funds and money from the county through the budget process.
“Because we had the ARPA funds early this year, we were very selective about the nonprofits to which we gave the ARPA funds,” she said.
Stewart said, however, that she was convinced the board had done its best.
“I know there were some organizations that didn’t get what they expected or felt it was unfair, but we really try to be fair to everyone and make sure we’re making the best use of taxpayers’ money,” she said.
“The district is a valuable partner”
Some nonprofits that received grants told CityView that the money will be used for a variety of creative purposes.
Terri Thomas, executive director of the Vision Resource Center, said her organization’s $15,000 grant will be used for improvements to the Braille trail and sensory garden at the center, 2736 Cedar Creek Road, as well as assistive technology to promote independent living, transportation options and a service in which volunteers read local newspaper articles on a streaming service to make news more accessible to the visually impaired.
At the Cumberland County Council On Older Adults, $100,215 from the county grant will allow the program to continue delivering meals to homebound seniors, executive director Lisa Hughes said. The Arts Council will receive $35,000 to support a 45-year-old program that pays artists to host one-off programs and classes at Title I schools, Sarah Busman, director of arts education, told CityView. And at the Cape Fear River Assembly, the $9,923 will support executive director Maya Miller’s part-time salary and the organization’s work with indigenous communities on issues affecting the Cape Fear River, Miller said.
But for some nonprofits that missed out, the lack of financial support from the county could be a problem, even though they may have other funding options.
Mary Sonnenberg, president of the Partnership for Children of Cumberland County, told CityView her organization had to try to combine multiple funding opportunities to support its work. The Partnership requested $300,000 to support its Family Connects program, which provides home visits for babies born at Cape Fear Valley Medical Center, but received no funding from the county, according to the budget proposal.
“Currently, insurance doesn’t cover these home visits, but Medicaid could,” she said. “I’ve funded early childhood programs for most of my 45-year career, and to provide the best services, you have to combine funding from all sorts of areas.”
While the lack of funding from the county is not ideal, she said she can understand the limitations the county is facing.
“My husband was a city manager for 30 years, so I know the ins and outs, and we had tight budgets this year as well,” Sonnenberg said. “We’ll continue to sit at the table, communicate our needs and try to work together and hopefully look for more opportunities for county support in the future.”
The partnership also had to cut 24% of its administrative budget for the coming fiscal year because of changes in funding for the North Carolina Pre-Kindergarten Program, she said. While EdNC reported the General Assembly voted Thursday to provide $67.5 million in additional funding for child care facilities, a Department of Health spokesperson said that was not enough to fully fund all child care facilities.
Sonnenberg considers the district a valuable partner.
“I think as long as we’re at the table, we can continue to build strong partnerships across a variety of resources for families,” Sonnenberg said. “Because one resource is not going to be all they need. That’s why we all need to be at the table and work together.”
Reporter Lexi Solomon can be reached at [email protected] or 910-423-6500.
This story was made possible by donations to the CityView News Fund, a 501c3 nonprofit organization dedicated to an informed democracy.
