By RYAN J. FOLEY

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — The Trump administration could gut research on the effectiveness of child welfare programs, with plans to terminate dozens of university grants studying improvements to Head Start and child care policy, according to a spreadsheet mistakenly made public this week.

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The document listed more than 150 research projects under consideration for termination by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. It covered grants funded by the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation, which says it “builds evidence to improve lives” by helping policymakers evaluate programs that help low-income children and families.

“These grants are aimed at learning how to make programs more effective at pursuing goals like healthy child development, reducing abuse and neglect and promoting economic self-sufficiency,” said Naomi Goldstein, who led the office for nearly two decades before she retired in 2022. “It’s hard to see why they would want to cancel these efforts.”

The grant cancellations would add to deep cuts already enacted at HHS’ Administration for Children and Families, which plans to close five regional offices and abruptly fired hundreds of workers one month ago. Its staffing has dropped from approximately 2,400 in January to 1,500, former employees say, and the administration has said it will fold ACF into other parts of HHS.

Other HHS divisions, such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health, have already cut billions of dollars in grants, including those related to public health, gender, race and other subjects opposed by President Donald Trump’s administration. The document released Wednesday marked the first news of plans for the possible mass terminations of ACF grants, although a department spokesperson later said it was only an outdated draft.

The proposed terminations would further undercut Head Start, the 60-year-old program overseen by ACF that supports preschool and services for hundreds of thousands of low-income children. Head Start has faced mass layoffs and a plan to eliminate its funding altogether in recent months. The grants facing termination included studies intended to answer key questions and improve its operations, such as how to retain more educators at local Head Start programs.

The spreadsheet also listed for termination grants worth millions of dollars for first-of-their-kind centers dedicated to better serving low-income Black and Hispanic children and families, located, respectively, at Morehouse College in Atlanta and at a nonprofit in Maryland.

Dozens of grants related to child care policy, child development, foster care, preventing child abuse, the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program and more were also listed as set for cancellation, reflecting ACF’s widespread portfolio.

Those studies help policymakers understand what works, a former administration official said.

“Ending these projects without explanation not only wastes taxpayer dollars, it also threatens the evidence base behind key safety net programs,” said Katie Hamm, who was ACF’s deputy assistant secretary for early childhood development until January. “It’s alarming that grantees and contractors had to find out this way, through an accidental email, rather than a transparent process.”

The information was mistakenly included in an email sent Wednesday to grant recipients at universities and nonprofits by an HHS employee, who asked them to review and update their contact information.

HHS recalled the message only after the spreadsheet, which had a column on whether funding would “terminate” or “continue” for each grant, had been downloaded by recipients. A department spokesperson said the document contained “outdated and predecisional information” but did not rule out that research inside the ACF could be cut.

“ACF is committed to ensuring that government funds are used in alignment with Administration priorities and are in the best interest of the American people,” spokesperson Andrew Nixon said.

Goldstein, the former research office director, said the situation “does appear to reflect a level of haste and chaos” at the agency.

Only 21 out of 177 listed grants were marked with a note to “continue” funding in the document. A small number had already ended, and some were marked for termination “at the end of budget period.”

The document didn’t list how much funding in all would be cut, but the office was responsible for $154 million in grants and contracts in fiscal year 2024.

More than 50 universities were listed as having grants terminated. Several other state agencies and nonprofits would also be affected.

A follow-up email told recipients to disregard the spreadsheet, but again asked for updated contact information. One researcher who spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid retaliation said they were expecting to receive formal notification soon that their grants would be ending. Several other grant recipients declined to comment.

Attorneys defending accused killer Luigi Mangione in his New York case are seeking to dismiss charges related to terrorism, and suppress evidence seized during police officers’ search of the Towson native.

In a New York Supreme Court filing Thursday, Mangione’s lawyers argued that state prosecutors’ terrorism charges fail to accurately describe the nature of his actions, and that the evidence obtained by law enforcement during the search of his backpack is inadmissible, given the fact that they conducted the search without a warrant.

The filing in the state’s case comes after Mangione pleaded not guilty to federal murder charges carrying the death penalty last week.

Mangione, the 2016 valedictorian of his high school, is charged in connection to the death of Brian Thompson, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare, who was fatally shot outside of hotel in Midtown Manhattan in December.

During the search, officers found a two-and-a-half page handwritten note, as well as a handgun magazine loaded with bullets.

In bringing terrorism charges against Mangione, state prosecutors assert that Mangione’s writings indicate that his actions were an attempt to intimidate or coerce a civilian population.

But Mangione’s lawyers state in their filing that his intention was not to terrorize any civilians, and suggested that the writings that are publicly referred to as his manifesto shouldn’t be described as such because he never meant for them to be released.

“Law enforcement is responsible for causing the very public intimidation or coercion they are now trying to attribute to Mr. Mangione,” wrote Mangione’s lawyers, “which is the basis for charging him with enhanced terror-related charges.”

The Manhattan District Attorney’s office declined to comment.

Have a news tip? Contact Mathew Schumer at mschumer@baltsun.com, 443-890-7423 and on X as @mmmschumer.

In 2024, City Councilmember Chris Banks’ Brooklyn District, which includes East New York, Brownsville and East Flatbush, saw the greatest number of income-restricted apartments built: 1,439. Meanwhile, two districts in Eastern Queens and Manhattan’s west side saw zero units.

Brooklyn’s 42nd Council district, represented by Chris Banks (pictured), produced the greatest amount of new housing last year. (John McCarten/NYC Council Media Unit)

In 2024, New York City helped create or preserve 27,620 affordable apartments, a nearly 10 percent boost compared to the average over the last five years. Just over 14,000 of those units were new construction, the second highest number on record.

But the building boom didn’t happen everywhere. Certain neighborhoods led the way, including Brooklyn’s City Council District 42—which spans East New York, East Flatbush and Brownsville—and central Bronx’s District 15. Meanwhile, two districts in Eastern Queens and Manhattan’s west side saw zero units, according to an annual analysis by the New York Housing Conference (NYHC) released this week.

The latest report follows similar trends as in previous years: the districts that produced the most affordable housing tended to be lower-income and predominantly home to Black and Latino residents. Areas that saw few new units had a higher average median income and more white residents, the analysis shows.

Above: The 10 City Council districts that produced the most new affordable housing last year, vs. the 10 districts that produced the least. (NYHC’ Housing Tracker)

“The Bronx is really showing up, once again, as the top producers in affordable housing,” said NYHC Executive Director Rachel Fee. Over the last decade, Bronx Council districts account for five of the 10 areas that saw the greatest number of new units.

New affordable housing over the last decade, by Council district.
Source: New York Housing Conference’s NYC Housing Tracker.

Next year’s 2025 tally has the potential to look different, Fee notes. Last year, state lawmakers replaced the expired 421a tax break for affordable housing developers with a new abatement program, 485-x, which is expected to incentivize more new construction. And in December, the City Council adopted a modified version of Mayor Eric Adams’ City of Yes for Housing plan, a series of zoning rule changes to allow for greater residential density citywide—what supporters say will help fill an historic housing shortage and curb rising homelessness.

But the plan faced opposition in a number of neighborhoods, primarily low-density areas in the outer boroughs where residents voiced concerns about potential out-of-scale development and strain on existing infrastructure. The final deal approved by the Council included a number of carveouts and modifications to appease that opposition (and the local lawmakers who represent those areas, who voted on the plan). It retained minimum parking requirements for new development in certain neighborhoods, and reduced the reach of some outer borough zones around public transit stations where extra density would’ve been permitted.

“We had a concern about the lack of infrastructure,” said Councilmember Banks, who was among the lawmakers who voted against the City of Yes plan (thought it ultimately passed the Council by vote of 31-to-20). The proposed removal of parking requirements for new development was particularly unpopular with his constituents, Banks said, describing parts of his district as a “transportation desert,” where residents rely on cars.

Still, the Brooklyn lawmaker—who took office at the start of 2024—said he was glad to see his district ranked highest when it came to new affordable units last year.

“We’re happy to be a model, in a sense. And we’re hoping for more housing to come, and housing that really meets the needs and the desires of the local community,” he said.

“Our focus now is to make sure that local residents who want to stay in the 42nd Council district get the opportunity to move into some of those new apartments,” Banks added.

Just how much say councilmembers get when it comes to new housing in their districts is under debate. A Charter Revision Commission convened by Mayor Adams to explore changes to the city’s housing processes released a preliminary report this week on the issues it’s considering, including the concept of “member deference”—a custom in which the Council defers to the vote of the local member on land use applications in neighborhoods they represent.

Supporters of the tradition, the report notes, say it “promotes political accountability in land use matters, with communities able to hold local members responsible for land use decisions and, if necessary, vote members out.”

On the other hand, critics say member deference fuels the uneven production of affordable units across neighborhoods, and stymies the city’s overall efforts to address its housing shortage.

“Councilmembers frequently use their power to block housing proposals altogether,” the Commission wrote, pointing to an analysis that found since 2022, “at least 3,547 units overall have been lost as a result of Council modifications to the scale of housing proposals or the withdrawal of housing proposals in the face of opposition.”

“The most significant consequence of member deference is, however, the most difficult to measure: the projects that are never even proposed,” the report notes. “If a potential project is in a district where a local member is likely to be hostile to new housing, it rarely reaches the filing stage.”

The Commission said it will explore ways “to give borough- or city-wide perspectives greater weight in the decision-making process,” when it comes to land use applications that require public review.

But Councilmember Banks disagrees with this approach. “The power when it comes to land use needs to stay within the Council. It needs be consistent with…being a bottom-up approach,” that starts with community board review, he said.

“I believe it’s a power grab by the administration,” he added. “This would be a way to kind of basically move around the Council.”

The Council has already passed legislation aimed at addressing geographic disparities in housing production. In 2023, lawmakers passed Speaker Adrienne Adams’ Fair Housing Framework, which mandates the city come up with a housing plan every five years that sets production “targets” for each of the 59 community districts—though stops short of mandating development.

Some housing groups, including the New York Housing Conference, have called for greater accountability for districts that don’t meet those goals. In its testimony to the Charter Revision Commission, NYHC recommended ending the land use public review process with the City Planning Commission “in districts that are not meeting their production targets”—bypassing the City Council vote in those instances.

“The long time use of member deference, even though it’s an informal process, has really shifted land use decisions in New York from what used to be something that really took into account more citywide needs. Now it’s really about local control,” Fee said.

And in a city where the recent housing vacancy rate was a dismal 1.4 percent—the lowest availability in more than 50 years— “every single project makes a difference,” she added.

“Each unit here is somebody’s home, and saying yes to housing is giving somebody that opportunity,” Fee said.

To reach the editor, contact Jeanmarie@citylimits.org

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The post Here’s Where Affordable Housing Was Built Last Year—& Where It Wasn’t appeared first on City Limits.

By DAVID BAUDER, AP Media Writer

The head of PBS said Friday that President Donald Trump’s executive order aiming to slash public subsidies to PBS and NPR was blatantly unlawful.

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Public Broadcasting Service CEO Paula Kerger said the Republican president’s order “threatens our ability to serve the American public with educational programming, as we have for the past 50-plus years.”

“We are currently exploring all options to allow PBS to continue to serve our member stations and all Americans,” Kerger said.

Trump signed the order late Thursday, alleging “bias” in the broadcasters’ reporting.

The order instructs the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and other federal agencies to “cease Federal funding” for PBS and National Public Radio and further requires that they work to root out indirect sources of public financing for the news organizations. The White House, in a social media posting announcing the signing, said the outlets “receive millions from taxpayers to spread radical, woke propaganda disguised as ‘news.’”

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funnels public funding to the two services, said that it is not a federal executive agency subject to Trump’s orders. The president earlier this week said he was firing three of the five remaining CPB board members — threatening its ability to do any work — and was immediately sued by the CPB to stop it.

The vast majority of public money for the services goes directly to its hundreds of local stations, which operate on a combination of government funding, donations and philanthropic grants. Stations in smaller markets are particularly dependent on the public money and most threatened by the cuts of the sort Trump is proposing.

Public broadcasting has been threatened frequently by Republican leaders in the past, but the local ties have largely enabled them to escape cutbacks — legislators don’t want to be seen as responsible for shutting down stations in their districts. But the current threat is seen as the most serious in the system’s history.

It’s also the latest move by Trump and his administration to utilize federal powers to control or hamstring institutions whose actions or viewpoints he disagrees with.

Since taking office in January for a second term, Trump has ousted leaders, placed staff on administrative leave and cut off hundreds of millions of dollars in funding to artists, libraries, museums, theaters and others, through takeovers of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Trump has also pushed to withhold federal research and education funds from universities and punish law firms unless they agree to eliminate diversity programs and other measures he has found objectionable.

Just two weeks ago, the White House said it would be asking Congress to rescind funding for the CPB as part of a $9.1 billion package of cuts. That package, however, which budget director Russell Vought said would likely be the first of several, has not yet been sent to Capitol Hill.

The move against PBS and NPR comes as Trump’s administration has been working to dismantle the U.S. Agency for Global Media, including Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, which were designed to model independent news gathering globally in societies that restrict the press.

Those efforts have faced pushback from federal courts, which have ruled in some cases that the Trump administration may have overstepped its authority in holding back funds appropriated to the outlets by Congress.

AP Congressional Correspondent Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report.