A Closer Look at What Got Chopped in This Year’s Budget

Shani O. Hilton at Colorlines

There’s been a lot of talk about the overall number for cuts: $38.5 billion overall and $14.7 billion to discretionary spending, which includes funding for social programs. But what’s inside these numbers? Here are a few of the larger cuts that are guaranteed to affect poor people and people of color (compared to 2010 funding levels):

  • Department of Labor training and employment grants to states: $1.4 billion
  • community health centers: $1 billion
  • Head Start: $1 billion
  • Public Housing Capital Fund: $1 billion
  • low-income energy assistance program: $390 million
  • family planning: $317.5 million
  • Native American housing block grants: $300 million
  • program to strengthen Historically Black Colleges and Universities: $85 million
  • program to strengthen tribal colleges: $30 million

All of these numbers are meaningless to the federal deficit, but likely deeply meaningful for the already overwhelmed programs being cut. Many of them will do harm in ways we won’t be able to measure for many years. The Public Housing Capital Fund is among the most drastic, however. The Fund pays for upkeep and modernization of the too often delapidated structures that are home to millions of working class, elderly, and disabled people of color.

As the Center on Budget Policy Priorities’ Douglas Rice explains, reducing the capital fund “would prevent many state and local agencies from making major repairs or renovations such as fixing leaky roofs and replacing broken heating systems that are necessary to prevent the deterioration of living conditions for low-income residents and to avert damage that could lead to more costly repairs in the future.” And that’s just one example of a cut that hurts the individuals who can least afford it, and will cost more money over time.