America's Service Commissions Statement on FY25 AmeriCorps Grants Being Held by OMB

America’s Service Commissions is raising the alarm on the hold by the federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) of fiscal year 2025 (FY25) appropriated funds for AmeriCorps grants urgently impacting the following.

• FY25 AmeriCorps State and National new and recompete grants selected for funding and notified their funding is being held “pending release of FY25 appropriated funds.” Of those selected some of these grants would start as early as July 1 and others no later than September 1. More than $66 million in funding for state service commission AmeriCorps State programs is currently being held.
• Nearly $10 million in FY25 Commission Investment Fund grants should have been awarded to state service commissions as of Friday, June 20 with a July 1 grant start.
• FY25 AmeriCorps Seniors Foster Grandparent Program (FGP) and Senior Companion Program (SCP) renewals, which should already be awarded for 132 programs with a July 1 grant start.

OMB shared the AmeriCorps agency’s FY25 spend plan in the President’s FY26 budget appendix and specified that $196 million of AmeriCorps’ FY25 appropriations would be “undistributed,” a budget line item previously not included in OMB materials. This is likely the amount needed to fund FY25 AmeriCorps State and National, AmeriCorps Seniors, and Commission Investment Fund new and recompete grants.

Congress has appropriated and the President has signed the FY25 appropriations bill into law, and the federal AmeriCorps agency (Corporation for National and Community Service) is prepared to distribute grants. However, the Office of Management and Budget is delaying release of these grant funds.

Any further delay in issuing these awards will have dire consequences for the hundreds of nonprofit and state government staff and thousands of AmeriCorps members and volunteers funded by these grants that deliver critical services to local communities, along with community partners like schools, disaster response organizations, food banks, etc. that depend on these members.

For decades, national and community service has proven to be a cost-effective investment that creates jobs, solves pressing local problems, and strengthens local communities. Each year, approximately 50,000 AmeriCorps members and 130,000 AmeriCorps Seniors volunteers are serving in communities to help address the opioid epidemic, mentor struggling students, provide job training, support veterans and military families, provide disaster relief and recovery efforts, and much more.

If Commission Investment Fund (CIF) grant funds are not awarded by July 1, 44% of state service commissions will have to lay off staff between July and September with additional layoffs later in the calendar year. The CIF grant provides funding for training, technical assistance, and program development activities which are critical for state service commissions in their oversight role of AmeriCorps State subgrants including preventing and detecting fraud, waste, and abuse.

National service is a bipartisan program with most of the funding being administered by governor-designated state service commissions and commissioners who select AmeriCorps programs based on local priorities. Almost 600 governor-appointed commissioners from 47 states and territories have signed on to a letter to leadership of the House and Senate Appropriations Subcommittees on Labor, HHS, and Education thanking them for funding in FY25 and requesting continued robust funding in FY26.

ASC urges OMB to release all FY25 appropriated AmeriCorps funds immediately to avoid any further delays and negative impacts on local communities in every state and territory.