The U.S. Department of Education (ED) announced more than $36 billion in emergency grants today provided under the American Rescue Plan (ARP) Act for postsecondary education. These grants will help over 5,000 institutions of higher education (institutions), including HBCUs, TCCUs, and HSIs, provide emergency financial aid to millions of students and ensure learning continues during the COVID-19 national emergency. Emergency funds provided by ARP more than double the emergency relief aid available to students and institutions already authorized under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES) and the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act (CRRSAA) relief legislation. This funding is provided by the ARP’s Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund (HEERF III), with a new formula requiring approximately half of the funding to be used by each institution to provide direct relief to students.

"These funds are critical to ensuring that all of our nation’s students – particularly those disproportionately impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic – have the opportunity to enroll, continue their education, graduate, and pursue their careers,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona. “With this action, thousands of institutions will be able to provide direct relief to students who need it most, so we can make sure that we not only recover from the pandemic, but also build back even stronger than before.”

To view the full press release, click here.

BOSTON (SHNS) – Replenishing unemployment trust funds to pre-pandemic levels is one of a host of allowable uses for the latest round of federal relief funds, according to new U.S. Treasury guidelines.

​The Treasury on Monday adopted a final interim rule outlining different ways state and local governments can use their fiscal recovery funds from the federal spending package known as the American Rescue Plan Act, and published a fact sheet offering details.

For more details and to read the full story, click here.

Today, the U.S. Department of Education (Department) released the State plan application that will support states in describing how they will use resources under the American Rescue Plan Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ARP ESSER) fund to continue to safely reopen schools, sustain their safe operations, and support students—especially those most impacted by the pandemic.

Last month, states received access to two-thirds of their ARP ESSER allocation—a total of $81 billion. The remaining $41 billion will become available after states' plans are approved by the Department. After the final one-third of funds are made available, states would have received access to nearly $122 billion to help safely reopen and sustain the safe operation of schools and address the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our nation's students.

For more details and to read the full story, click here.

The Biden administration on Thursday announced it is releasing $39 billion in funding for the child care industry from the American Rescue Plan.

The administration said the funds are going to states, territories and tribes and are for addressing the child care crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, which has lowered enrollment at child care facilities and caused some to close.

For more details and to read the full story, click here.

The U.S. Department of Education is soliciting comments on a proposed extension without changes of the Grant Performance Report Form (ED 524-B).

DoEd is especially interested in public comment addressing the following issues: (1) Is this collection necessary to the proper functions of the Department; (2) will this information be processed and used in a timely manner; (3) is the estimate of burden accurate; (4) how might the Department enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information to be collected; and (5) how might the Department minimize the burden of this collection on the respondents, including through the use of information technology.

Comments are due by May 17, 2021.

For full details, visit www.federalregister.gov.

The former head of a defunct Arkansas nonprofit that helped at-risk youth was sentenced Wednesday to 30 months in prison for diverting more than $120,000 from the group to an unnamed state senator in a widening corruption probe that has ensnared several former lawmakers.

U.S. District Judge Susan O. Hickey sentenced Jerry Walsh, 72, who pleaded guilty in 2018 conspiring to divert more than $380,000 from South Arkansas Youth Services without the authority of the organization’s board of directors. Federal prosecutors say the scheme involved diverting the money to a state senator identified only as “Arkansas Senator C” and the lobbying firm of Rusty Cranford, who pleaded guilty in 2018 to bribing three former lawmakers.
Hickey also ordered Walsh to pay more than $515,000 in restitution.
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Read the full original article at  usnews.com

​A nonprofit crime-victims advocacy organization misappropriated nearly $200,000 in grant money from the Washington Attorney General’s Office by submitting invoices for tasks the group didn’t actually complete, a new report from the state auditor found. Washington Coalition of Crime Victim Advocates (WCCVA) misappropriated $199,978 in state money between 2015 and 2017, the report found. The Legislature, in 2013, ordered the Attorney General’s Office to give annual grant money to the WCCVA to fund training for crime-victim advocates.

Click here to view the full article.

Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson

​All the counseling, therapy and medication did little to ease 9-year-old Sobie Cummings’ crippling anxiety and feelings of isolation. And so a psychiatrist suggested that a service dog might help the autistic child connect with other kids. To Glenn and Rachel Cummings, Mark Mathis seemed like a dream come true. His kennel, Ry-Con Service Dogs, was just a couple of hours away, and he, too, had a child with autism. But what clinched the decision were Mathis’ credentials. “Is Ry-Con a certified program? Yes,” stated an online brochure. “In 2013, Mark was certified as a North Carolina state-approved service dog trainer with a specialty in autism service dogs for children.”

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​New Mexico State Auditor, Tim Keller, states that the allegations against a charter school manager for mishandling $700,000 indicate a larger pattern of poor oversight. According to Keller’s investigation, Julieanne Maestas, La Promesa’s former assistant business manager, diverted more than $475,000 from La Promesa into her personal bank account from June 2010 to July 2016. In addition, she deposited about $177,000 worth of checks that were payable to the former executive director – her mother, Albuquerque Public Schools board member Analee Maestas – as well as to her boyfriend, who was a school maintenance vendor. The La Promesa Early Learning Center was audited annually, but the audits did not discover any evidence of fraud or embezzlement throughout the six years of alleged mishandling. 

​In Fiscal Year 2017, federal agencies reported $8.8 billion in confirmed fraud, according to a new report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office.  The GAO report looks at progress made by federal agencies and OMB to reduce fraud risks since Congress enacted the Fraud Reduction and Data Analytics Act of 2015 (FRDAA). That Act requires agencies to establish financial and administrative controls for managing fraud risks, creating a Fraud Risk Framework in the process.

One leading practice described in the Fraud Risk Framework is using the results of monitoring, evaluation, audits, and investigations to improve fraud prevention, detection, and response. In its new report, the GAO said that about 86 percent of agencies indicated that they use results of monitoring, evaluation, audits, and investigations to manage fraud risk, but only 54 percent did so on a regular basis.

​The federal agencies’ reports of their fraud risk management activities is illustrated below:

Areas of risk include grant fraud, defined as when award recipients attempt to deceive the government about their spending of award money outside the parameters of the grant. Other high risk areas described in the report are payroll, beneficiary payments, large contracts, and purchase and travel cards.

​Click here to read more