The National Association of State Directors of Pupil Transportation Services (NASDPTS) announced two bylaw updates, including a sunsetting of the School Bus Manufacturers Technical Council (SBMTC), “as it no longer adequately represents the Supplier Council membership.”

Formed as a subsidiary of the NASDPTS Supplier Council, SBMTC had two representatives on the National Congress on School Transportation steering committee. It was as a technical advisor on issues related to school bus manufacturing and safety and provided a forum for manufacturers to address technical and governmental relations issues concerning the production and acceptability of school bus chassis and bodies. SBMTC also contributed to national safety standards, such as those developed by NCST.

No timetable was given for its dissolution.

The other approved change to the bylaws was the prevention of the NASDPTS president or president-elect from also simultaneously serving as the National Congress on School Transportation Chair or Vice Chair. NASDPTS President Mike Stier said in a letter to state directors and Supplier Council members Tuesday that this is due “to the volume of work required by both leadership positions.”

NASDPTS also updated its Board of Directors, announcing that Wyoming state director Trenton Vonburg chose not to run for re-election as secretary this year. Instead, Fred Steward, the new Colorado state director, will take on that role.

Mike Bulman, the South Carolina State Director, was elected to his second term as Southern Region Representative. Chris Kath, the Indiana state director is also going on his second term as the Central Region Representative. And Dave Christopher, the New York Association of Pupil Transportation executive director, is serving his first term as State Transportation Associations Council chair.

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Related: NHTSA Rulemaking at Heart of NCST Resolutions Focused on Safety
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Related: NHTSA Investigates Autonomous Waymo Rides After Illegal School Bus Passing

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NASDPTS also announced the 2026 Annual Conference will be held Nov. 15-17 at the Ritz-Carlton Pentagon City in Arlington, Virginia.

“Holding the NASDPTS Conference in the Washington, D.C., area affords us the opportunity to hear first-hand from our federal agency partners, but also provides an excellent venue for us to come together, as an association, to get to know one another and to discuss the issues facing the school transportation industry every day,” said NASDPTS President-Elect and Conference Chair Tyler Bryan, of Delaware. “We thank our incredibly generous sponsors as this meeting is simply not possible without them.”

The post NASDPTS Sunsets School Bus Manufacturers Technical Council, Announces Updates appeared first on School Transportation News.

Federal agents, including members of the Department of Homeland Security, the Border Patrol, and police, attempt to keep protesters back outside a downtown U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility on Oct. 4, 2025 in Portland, Oregon. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

Members of the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee decried violence against law enforcement, but seemed to make little headway in identifying how to address the issue during a Wednesday hearing that often saw each party harshly blame the other.

Chairman Andrew Garbarino of New York, at his first hearing since taking over as for the retired Mark Green of Tennessee, sought to strike an even tone in an opening statement, condemning violence against police while noting that officers have a responsibility to maintain the public’s trust.

“Law enforcement personnel are public servants, not public figures. They stepped forward to safeguard our nation and uphold the laws enacted by this body,” Garbarino said. “But that alone does not absolve them from facing any form of accountability. Public trust and public safety go hand in hand.” 

Other members of the panel, though, were less even-handed, with Democrats strongly criticizing some tactics used by federal law enforcement officers under President Donald Trump and Republicans denouncing such criticism as fueling violence against police.

Several members of the panel, of both parties, acknowledged the two West Virginia National Guard members shot in a Nov. 26 alleged ambush in Washington, D.C.

Police witnesses denounce Nazi comparisons

Witnesses from three police organizations, the Fraternal Order of Police, the National Sheriffs’ Association and the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, largely agreed that heightened rhetoric about law enforcement activity was a danger to their members.

“The rhetoric coming from the top, calling officers Nazis and Gestapo, it better stop right now,” Jonathan Thompson, the executive director of the National Sheriffs’ Association, said. 

“You are inflaming dangerous circumstances. You’re attacking people that wake up every single day and do one thing: they put on their uniforms, they put on their star and… enforce the laws of this country.”

Daniel Hodges, a D.C. Metropolitan Police officer who responded to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack and who Democrats invited to testify to the panel as a private citizen Wednesday, said protocol of federal officers under Trump invited the comparison.

“There is a semi-secret police force abducting people based on the color of their skin and sending many of them via state-sponsored human trafficking to extraterritorial concentration camps,” he said. 

“Before we go around the room clutching our pearls, wondering how people could possibly compare law enforcement in this country to the Gestapo, maybe we should take a moment and ask ourselves if there isn’t some recent behavior on the government’s part that could encourage such juxtaposition,” Hodges said.

Patrick Yoes, the national president of the Fraternal Order of Police, said violence against officers was a nonpartisan issue.

“My members are both Democrat and Republican,” he said. “And we’re all having the same problem.”

ICE under microscope

Several Democrats said the tactics used by officers of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and its parent agency, the Department of Homeland Security, undermined their law enforcement mission and endangered them, while Republicans blamed that rhetoric for making police targets.

New York Democrat Daniel Goldman, a former federal prosecutor, objected to Thompson’s testimony that police officers “put on their uniforms.”

“The problem is that’s not the case,” Goldman said. “They don’t put on a uniform, they don’t wear identification, and they go out with masks on to — violently in many cases — arrest unsuspecting immigrants, non-violent, many of whom are actually here legally.”

Goldman said as a federal prosecutor he worked with DHS officers “who represented the very, very best of our country.” But under Trump, the department’s behavior had grown irresponsible, he said.

Illinois Democrat Delia Ramirez went further, calling DHS “the single biggest threat to public safety right now.”

“They use anonymity to terrorize our communities and to violate our rights,” she said. “They reject accountability. They disregard court orders and they violate consent decrees. Bottom line: DHS agents lie. They act with impunity. They reject checks and balances, and they ignore Congress and the courts.”

GOP defends DHS

Republicans on the panel deflected blame from DHS and drew a direct line from the rhetoric of some Democrats opposed to ICE’s tactics to physical attacks on law enforcement.

Tennessee Republican Andy Ogles said Ramirez’s comment “pisses me off” and characterized DHS agents as carrying out the rule of law.

“This is about the rhetoric against law enforcement, violence against law enforcement,” Ogles said. “This isn’t about ICE. This isn’t about deportations, or the (Homeland Security) secretary doing her job, securing the border and deporting those who are here illegally.”

Rep. Eli Crane, an Arizona Republican, played a video showing Rep LaMonica McIver, a New Jersey Democrat who also sits on the panel, confronting ICE agents at a detention facility in her district.

“What do you think it means to people that are out there watching and listening, watching social media, watching the news, and they see a member of Congress who sits on this committee go out there and behave like that?” Crane asked the witnesses.

Thompson answered he was “appalled.”

“Quite honestly, I find it reprehensible, and it’s obviously dangerous,” he said.

McIver said she had been doing her job to provide oversight.

Jan. 6 pardons at issue

Democrats also cited Trump’s pardons of people convicted of crimes as part of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol as condoning violence against law enforcement.

McIver suggested committee Republicans were hypocritical in condemning some anti-police rhetoric while staying silent or praising Trump’s decision to pardon Jan.6 rioters.

“It is not Democrats who are praising, let alone pardoning, people who stormed this very Capitol complex to beat police officers and hunt down elected officials,” she said.

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• Eve Galanter created the Wisconsin Civics Games as a way to get high school students civically engaged.
  
• The quiz-show style contest first held in 2019 has been coordinated by the Wisconsin Newspaper Association, and has grown annually. 
  
• The competition has gotten to be such a large endeavor that WNA leaders asked the Universities of Wisconsin to take the reins. 
  
• The contest fits with the university system’s strategic plan, and Galanter is excited to see how the games expand in the coming years. 

It’s been nearly a decade since Eve Galanter, a retired teacher and reporter in Madison, read the news story that led her to start a statewide competition to get high schoolers excited about government. 

Galanter, now 84, had just read a Wisconsin State Journal article headlined “All three school board incumbents running unopposed.”

“I looked at that and I thought, ‘Are they really doing such a fabulous job, or is no one interested? Does no one have any idea what might be involved in being on a school board or a city council or a village or town board?”

Running unopposed is a modern norm in some Wisconsin public offices. Across the state’s 10 most populous counties, less than a quarter of races for county board supervisor were contested in 2020, according to an analysis by the Wisconsin Policy Forum.

Studies show a growing number of people in the United States and across the world can’t answer basic questions about how the government works. U.S. schools cut back on civics education decades ago. In Wisconsin, students can graduate high school without taking a single course on the subject, though they must pass a civics test.

For two years Galanter mulled ways to get more Wisconsinites interested in running for local office. She settled on a quiz game where high school students across the state would test their knowledge of democracy and rights for the chance to win college scholarships.  

“If people understood how government worked, then surely they would be more interested in public service as a future occupation,” said Galanter, who served on the Madison City Council, ran former U.S. Sen. Herb Kohl’s Madison office and used to open all her public presentations with the same line: “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.”

In 2018, she pitched her idea to the Wisconsin Newspaper Association, a membership organization of the state’s papers, figuring their publications could get the word out across the state.

The association agreed, and the Wisconsin Civics Games were born. Soon staff were making plans for regional playoffs and a state final at the Capitol where members of the winning team would each receive $2,000 in scholarships. 

Since then, teams from 76 high schools have competed, and interest continues to grow. This year’s regional playoffs, held in April, drew 205 students — twice as many as the first year. 

The competition has grown so much, in fact, that it’s too big for the five staff members of the Wisconsin Newspaper Association to handle. They’re now handing the reins to the Universities of Wisconsin, which has sponsored the event since its inception.

“It needs to continue to grow, but … it’s a really big project,” said Beth Bennett, executive director of the association. “We just needed to find a home for it where somebody could take it to the next level.” 

The games will be overseen by the university system’s Wisconsin Institute for Citizenship and Civil Dialogue, which will soon become the Office of Civic Engagement, said Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman. Separately, that office will host civic education workshops for teachers across the state over the next three years, funded by a $1.1 million grant through the U.S. Department of Education’s American History & Civics Seminars program.

“This is consistent with our strategic plan focusing on freedom of expression, civil dialogue and really having students learn more about civics, which is important to our state and our nation,” Rothman said of taking the lead on the games. “So we are really excited about this opportunity.”

‘A republic, if you can keep it’

In preparation for the first Wisconsin Civics Games, Galanter pulled out a legal pad and began jotting questions. “What are the five freedoms identified in the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution?” “In 1982, Wisconsin was the first state to outlaw what type of discrimination?”

By the time she was done, she had over 100. 

Then she called school principals across the state to urge them to field teams. She contacted presidents of University of Wisconsin campuses to ask them to host playoffs. 

When students began registering, she looked up their local legislators to encourage them to congratulate the constituents and send them a Wisconsin Blue Book. She even wrote to Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor to ask her to speak at the finals.

“Her scheduler said that she was busy for the next several years,” Galanter said with a laugh, but the Justice agreed to send a letter congratulating the contestants.

“I strongly believe that the future of our nation depends upon your ability to practice democratic principles as thoughtful, informed citizens and public servants,” Sotomayor wrote. 

Sotomayor went on to recount the story of Benjamin Franklin leaving the Constitutional Convention in 1787, where he had just helped draft the new U.S. Constitution. 

“Benjamin Franklin was asked what sort of government he and his fellow framers had created. Dr. Franklin famously replied, ‘A republic, if you can keep it.’ By working to expand your civic knowledge in preparation for this tournament, you have begun the important undertaking of keeping our republic strong and vibrant,” Sotomayor wrote.

Galanter knew the games were a success when she overheard a comment from a participant at one of the regional playoffs that first year.

“One of the students said, ‘I’m going to go home and tell my parents about this,’” Galanter recalled. “I just thought that was the most wonderful thing: that they were so excited and wanted to share this opportunity.” 

The need for civics education persists today, though studies suggest Americans may be getting more knowledgeable. Each year, the Annenberg Public Policy Center at the University of Pennsylvania asks Americans about the Constitution and the government. In 2022, just 47% could name all three branches of the U.S. government and a full 25% couldn’t name one. Three years later, 70% of Americans could name all three, and just 13% couldn’t name one.

New home, same games

Galanter recently filled a box with the materials and questions she’d prepared for past games and sent it off to Rothman.

“I am so excited that the Universities of Wisconsin will be taking the games to yet a higher level,” Galanter told Wisconsin Watch. She hopes the fact that the universities already have connections with high schools statewide will mean more students will hear about “the opportunities to undertake keeping our republic strong and vibrant.”

The behind-the-scenes shuffling won’t change things for contestants. Teams interested in the 2026 games can register for free through March 1 to compete and receive study materials. Regional playoffs will be held online April 8-9, and the finals, which are open to the public, will be held on May 1. For more information, visit wnanews.com/wisconsin-civics-games.

But while no changes are planned for the 2026 games, at least one could be coming in the future. When the games returned in 2022 after a two-year hiatus during the COVID-19 pandemic, the regional playoffs moved online. Rothman hopes they might eventually return to UW campuses. 

“I’m sure, as things go along, we will look for ways to continue to improve and upgrade the competition, but it’s a terrific competition today,” said Rothman, who attended the finals in May. 

“You see the engagement of those high school students, and you talk to them and you find out what their future plans are and the amount of work that they have put in, along with their faculty advisors,” Rothman said. 

“You can see it in those students’ eyes: They’re going to be active and engaged in their communities going forward, and that’s good for all of us.”

How a Madison woman’s question sparked a growing statewide civics contest is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Farmworkers gather produce near Hemet, Calif. The Trump administration is making it easier for farmers to employ guest workers from other countries. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

In a tacit admission that U.S. food production requires foreign labor, the Trump administration is making it easier for farmers to employ guest workers from other countries.

At the same time, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in recent months appears to be refraining from conducting agricultural workplace raids, even as it scours Democratic-led cities for immigrants who are in the country illegally.

“We really haven’t seen agriculture targeted with worksite enforcement efforts, and early this year we did,” said Julia Gelatt, associate director of U.S. immigration policy at the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank.

The shifts come as many Americans are concerned about the rising cost of food, creating political problems for a president who campaigned on lowering them. Last week, the administration also announced it would lift tariffs on some foreign food products, including bananas, beef, coffee and tomatoes.

To ease labor shortages on farms and ranches, the administration last month made changes to the federal H-2A visa program, which allows employers to hire foreign workers for temporary agricultural jobs when there aren’t enough U.S.-born workers available. Under the new rule, the Department of Homeland Security will approve H-2A visas more quickly.

“Our immigration system has been broken for decades, and we finally have a President who is enforcing the law and prioritizing fixing programs farmers and ranchers rely on to produce the safest and most productive food supply in the world,” the U.S. Department of Agriculture said in an email to Stateline.

But the move to increase the supply of foreign agricultural workers conflicts with a July statement by Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins that “the promise to America, to ensure that we have a 100% American workforce, stands.”

Rollins also said the administration was committed to the mass deportation of immigrants who are here illegally, but that it would be “strategic so as not to compromise our food supply.” Ultimately, she said, the solution would be increased automation of agricultural jobs.

The government has issued about 420,000 H-2A visas for agricultural workers every year since 2023, which amounts to about half of the 812,000 agricultural worker jobs. They are concentrated in states that grow fruits and vegetables as opposed to grains, which are increasingly planted and harvested using machines. The government expects an additional 119,000 visas to be issued under the new rule.

Almost half the H-2A visas in the 2025 fiscal year were in Florida (60,000), Georgia (44,000), California (37,000), Washington state (36,000) and North Carolina (28,000).

Lower wages

The new H-2A rule also includes new hourly wage guidelines that vary by state but are lower than previous wages, and allows employers to charge workers for housing that used to be free. In North Carolina, for instance, the new rate is $11.09 for unskilled workers compared with $16.16 last year. In California, the rate is $13.45 for unskilled workers compared with $19.97 last year, though minimum wage laws in California and some other states would apply to those jobs, according to a Cornell University analysis.

In North Carolina, farmers are looking forward to lower labor costs, said Lee Wicker, deputy director of the North Carolina Growers Association, a trade association that brought 11,000 guest workers to the state through the H-2A guest worker program last year.

“If you think farmers are making more money in these conditions, you’re wrong. They’re going broke,” Wicker said. Workers will take a pay cut under new guidelines and will have to pay for housing, but that may help farmers stave off bankruptcy, he said.

“I’m not saying the workers are going to be happy about this, but I think they’ll come back. Wages have gone down before and they kept coming,” he added.

Jeffrey Dorfman, an agricultural and resource economics professor at North Carolina State University, said the changes will be a boon to the state’s farmers.

“The move to lower the H-2A wages by the Trump administration will be very well received by growers in North Carolina and will save farmers tens of millions of dollars statewide,” Dorfman said. “For many farmers, it will turn money-losing crops into money-making crops, if prices stay about where they are now.”

Unionized California farmworkers are opposed to the pay cuts and loss of free housing in the new guest worker visa plan, said Antonio De Loera-Brust, a spokesperson for the United Farm Workers, which represents about 10,000 workers in California.

The union sued the administration over ICE raids in the fields earlier this year, but recently “it’s been pretty quiet,” he said.

“For us it’s been really a one-two punch,” De Loera-Brust said. “First came the raids, which hurt workers, and now in order to appease business interests, they make all these concessions on wages and the guest workers program.”

Fewer raids

The administration quickly walked back a June directive to avoid raids on the agriculture and hospitality industries. Nevertheless, ICE raids on those employers have been more infrequent in the months since.

In June, ICE raided a dairy farm in New Mexico and a meatpacking plant in Nebraska. Since then, the agency has raided only a handful of food and agriculture employers, such as a July raid on a California marijuana grower and an Arizona restaurant chain, and a September raid to arrest Wisconsin dairy workers.

Earlier this month, ICE agents descended on an onion farm in Northern California, arresting four immigrants on charges of illegally selling farmworker visas.

Even as ICE ramps up its activity in North Carolina cities such as Charlotte and Raleigh, Wicker, of the growers trade group, said farms in the state have not been targeted.

Gelatt, of the Migration Policy Institute, said that’s been true of farms and ranches in many states since June.

“In past administrations we’ve seen a very quiet de-emphasis of immigration enforcement at farms. You don’t need to make an announcement. You don’t need to fight in the courts,” Gelatt said. “It is possible just to direct enforcement activities away from farms. It’ll be hard to know if that’s happened now, but I would not be surprised.”

While farmworkers in California are seeing some relief from raids, life is still uneasy for them, De Loera-Brust said.

“Overall, they have clearly slowed down [raids] in ag areas, but that’s not policy. They could resume at any time. People are living with uncertainty,” he said.

Stateline reporter Tim Henderson can be reached at thenderson@stateline.org.

New EPA draft rules seek to narrow the scope of the Clean Water Act by further defining the Waters of the United States. Pictured here is Little Walnut Creek in Waukee, Iowa on May 5, 2025. (Photo by Cami Koons/Iowa Capital Dispatch)

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed Monday new rules to define the waters of the United States, or WOTUS, protected under the Clean Water Act. 

The move was celebrated by farm groups that oppose a broad interpretation of the law, while environmental groups said the rule change would end protections for millions of acres of wetlands and small streams. 

Waters of the United States defines the scope of the Clean Water Act and which waters can be regulated with federal water quality standards. The WOTUS definition, which is not laid out in the Clean Water Act, has been the source of several U.S. Supreme Court cases in recent decades, most recently in Sackett v. EPA. 

The high court ruled in May 2023 that wetlands without a “continuous surface connection” to navigable waters did not qualify for Clean Water Act protections. This was upheld by EPA final rules issued in August 2023, that not only applied to wetlands, but also removed the requirement that waters have a “significant nexus” to a navigable water. 

Some conservative groups and lawmakers argued the 2023 EPA interpretation did not go far enough to adhere to the court’s decision in the Sackett case. 

EPA’s new rules, made in conjunction with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, would “fully implement”  the Sackett decision, “accelerate economic prosperity” and support the role of states and tribes in regulating their land, according to the agency’s news release. 

“When finalized, the rule will cut red tape and provide predictability, consistency, and clarity for American industry, energy producers, the technology sector, farmers, ranchers, developers, businesses, and landowners for permitting under the Clean Water Act,” the EPA release said.

The proposed rules would further define terms like: relatively permanent, continuous surface connection and tributary. The rules also establish that tributaries must connect to navigable waters via features that have “consistent” and “predictable flow.” 

The rules say wetlands must be “indistinguishable” from jurisdictional waters, with a “continuous surface connection.” The rules will also limit permafrost wetlands from the scope of the definition, include guidance on “wet season” water bodies, and offer exclusions on ditches, prior converted cropland, and waste treatment systems.

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said the proposed rules will protect navigable waters, advance cooperative federalism and result in economic growth. 

“Democrat Administrations have weaponized the definition of navigable waters to seize more power from American farmers, landowners, entrepreneurs, and families,” Zeldin said in a statement. “We heard from Americans across the country who want clean water and a clear rule. No longer should America’s landowners be forced to spend precious money hiring an attorney or consultant just to tell them whether a Water of the United States is on their property.” 

According to the release, the proposed rules were formed around feedback from states, tribal nations, local governments and listening sessions. 

American Farm Bureau Federation President Zippy Duvall said, in the release with EPA, the farm organization was “pleased” with the new rules. 

“The Supreme Court clearly ruled several years ago that the government overreached in its interpretation of what fell under federal guidelines,” Duvall said. “We are still reviewing the entire rule, but we are pleased that it finally addresses those concerns and takes steps to provide much-needed clarity.” 

The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association similarly celebrated the draft rules Monday. The association’s president and Nebraska cattleman Buck Wehrbein said the previous interpretations of the rule have meant things like “prairie potholes or dry ditches” fall under federal regulation. 

“Waters of the U.S. has been a longstanding and frustrating issue for family farmers and ranchers,” he said in a statement. “Every few years, the definition of a ‘water of the U.S.’ has changed … We appreciate the EPA finally fixing previous WOTUS rules and supporting America’s family farmers and ranchers.”

Environmental groups said the newly proposed rules put habitat, drinking water and structures at greater risk. 

Environmental Defense Fund’s Vice President Will McDow said EPA’s proposed rules were “not based in science, difficult to implement in practice and will create a dangerous lack of clarity.”

“This rule brings tremendous uncertainty and risk to our nation’s drinking water, flood protections and critical habitats,” McDow said in a statement. 

The environmental group Food & Water Watch said the draft rules eliminate “bedrock” protections for rivers, streams, and wetlands. The group said in a news release the rules would “compound the damage” of the Sackett decision that “eliminated protections for tens of millions of acres of sensitive wetlands and small streams.” 

Food & Water Watch Legal Director Tarah Heinzen said the rule “flies in the face of science and commonsense” and will lead to more pollution downstream. Wetlands, Heinzen said, offer “critical functions” in providing habitat, protecting clean water and reducing flooding. 

“Clean water is under attack in America, as polluting profiteers plunder our waters — Trump’s EPA is openly aiding and abetting this destruction,” Heinzen said. “This proposed rule weakens the bedrock Clean Water Act, making it easier to fill, drain, and pollute sensitive waterways from coast to coast.” 

The proposed rules will be published in the Federal Register and open for public comment for 45 days. EPA and the Army will hold two public meetings before developing final rules.

Advocates who urged the Oregon legislature to increase child care funding in January 2024 hung onesies and other children’s clothes on a tent outside the Capitol in Salem. Officials in Oregon and other states are relying on their own funds to keep Head Start programs afloat during the federal government shutdown. (Photo by Julia Shumway/Oregon Capital Chronicle)

With some early childhood education centers already closing their doors because of the federal government shutdown, local leaders are scrambling to find money to keep Head Start programs available to some of the country’s most vulnerable children.

Head Start programs, which serve more than 700,000 low-income children across the country, are almost entirely federally funded. In addition to free preschool, centers provide health screenings, parent resources and meals for children up to 5 years old. But the record-long government shutdown has forced child care centers across the country to close as funding is exhausted.

The closures are creating stark choices for some of the most vulnerable families in society. Migrant farmworkers, for example, who are more likely to be without health insurance and tend not to have any vacation time, are faced with the prospect of missing work, and a paycheck, to care for their children. A network of Head Start programs for migrant farmworkers’ children that operates in states across the South closed its sites on Friday.

To keep Head Start programs operating in her state, Massachusetts Democratic Gov. Maura Healey announced plans to advance $20 million in additional funding for the program. Those grant funds were previously approved to improve and expand the Massachusetts program, which gets about 80% of its funding from the federal government.

In a statement last week, Healey said the state was doing everything it could to support those programs, “but we don’t have the resources to make up for what the federal government owes.”

In Atlanta, private funders made an $8 million loan to keep Georgia’s largest Head Start providers afloat for the coming weeks.

Frank Fernandez, the president and CEO of Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta, told CBS News that the measure was only a temporary solution: “Our elected officials must take action to end this shutdown and ensure the long-term sustainability of this critical program,” Fernandez said.

In Washington state, some school systems that operate Head Start programs are using their own funds to keep kids in classrooms, the Seattle Times reported. Still, other operations are cutting back staff and services to make do.

In neighboring Oregon, state officials are working out details of a 60-day deal to use existing funds to keep Head Start going, the Oregon Capital Chronicle reported. State officials said Head Start providers must have experienced a delay in federal funds and the state assistance will not exceed the total amount of money awarded to a program by Oregon annually.

“It’s important to note that this is not a loan to Head Start programs and is not ‘backfilling,’” Kate Gonsalves, a spokesperson for the state’s early learning department said in a statement. “These are dual-funded programs so the state dollars are not replacing federal funds but can be drawn down earlier in the cycle.”

Some sites already shuttered

Head Start sites in 18 states have already closed their doors, according to the First Five Years Fund, a nonprofit advocating for quality child care and early childhood education.

The National Head Start Association, a nonprofit representing Head Start programs, said full or partial closures have affected 8,000 children. Nationwide, programs serving 65,000 children hadn’t received their federal funds as of Saturday, according to the group.

In Ohio, seven Head Start programs have exhausted their federal funds. Two have already closed, affecting 600 children and 150 employees. In the coming weeks, the Ohio Head Start Association says the other five will be forced to close their doors, affecting nearly 3,700 Ohio kids.

“Every day the shutdown continues, Ohio children and families are paying the price,” Julie Stone, Executive Director of the association said in a statement. “Head Start isn’t a political issue — it’s a lifeline for working families.”

Farmworkers’ children

Agricultural farmworkers, many of whom travel for seasonal work, have been hit particularly hard.

East Coast Migrant Head Start Project, which runs 43 Head Start centers in multiple states, suspended services on Friday. Around 1,200 children of agricultural farmworkers are without services now, but the number of children served fluctuates by season. The network is funded to serve 3,000 children of farmworkers across Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Virginia, and partners with other groups in a few other states.

In Florida, that means more than 800 children of agricultural workers are going without care due to the lapse in federal funding, said John Menditto, chief legal officer of East Coast Migrant Head Start Project. The group has also had to furlough its staff.

About 60% of farmworkers are American citizens or are in the country legally. Head Start is open to all children, regardless of their parents’ immigration status.

In rural North Florida, roughly 80 children have been without early education, language and disability therapies, said Leannys Mendoza Gutierrez, the campus director for the migrant Head Start program in rural Jennings, Florida, which cares for babies 6 weeks old to kids up to 5 years old.

“[Farmworkers] are putting food on our tables, for all of us,” she said. “However, they are not so far receiving services due to this situation that we don’t know when it’s going to end.”

Migrant farmworker families in Gutierrez’s program work in North Florida and South Georgia on watermelon, cucumber, cabbage, pepper, tomato, strawberry and pine straw farms.

Many parents have been forced to skip work and lose pay because they have been unable to find child care alternatives, Gutierrez said. She added that her program steps in to cover pediatrician bills for families that don’t have health insurance. The shutdown has prevented her program from offering such assistance, too, she said.

Many farmworkers don’t have health insurance and already struggle with poverty, making staying home from work difficult. Many also receive food aid through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which has also been affected by the shutdown.

“The shutdown just accentuates everything,” said Amy Liebman of the Migrant Clinicians Network, which works with clinics across the nation that serve migrant workers and their families. “Everyone’s concerned, they’re worried about the families they serve.”

Two other programs, one serving kids in the capital area of Tallahassee and another, Redlands Christian Migrant Association, which serves about 1,700 kids of agricultural workers in Florida, have also suspended services, according to the National Head Start Association.

Stateline reporter Kevin Hardy can be reached at khardy@stateline.org. Stateline reporter Nada Hassanein can be reached at nhassanein@stateline.org

Children playing with colorful wooden building blocks. (Getty Images) 

WASHINGTON — Funding for scores of Head Start programs hung in the balance as the government shutdown continued Monday without an end in sight. 

Unless a deal is reached to end the ongoing funding lapse that began Oct. 1, more than 65,000 children in 140 local Head Start programs across 41 states and Puerto Rico will not get their federal grant funding come Nov. 1, according to the National Head Start Association. The federal government spent about $12.3 billion on the program in fiscal 2025.

Community programs that receive Head Start funding have different start dates for when their grants are available. 

Head Start helps fund roughly 1,600 community programs that served more than 790,000 children during the 2023-2024 program year. 

The program is managed by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the employees in that agency who would disburse those awards are currently furloughed because of the shutdown.

Six programs serving 6,525 children did not receive a grant award Oct. 1 and are already tapping into outside resources and local funds to stay afloat. If the shutdown continues past Friday, another 134 programs that serve 58,627 children will lose federal grant funding. 

Head Start provides early childhood education, nutritious meals, health screenings and other support services to low-income families. 

It is a discretionary program and subject to congressional approval each year, making it particularly vulnerable to the government shutdown. 

“There’s just so much instability … that this is causing,” Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the advocacy group the National Head Start Association, told States Newsroom. “And while we’re hopeful and we’re going to be doing everything we possibly can to try to minimize the impact directly on children and families, there is going to be a long-term impact, no matter what, that is felt.” 

Shutdown standoff

The shutdown began Oct. 1, the start of the fiscal year, when Congress failed to appropriate money for federal programs. 

Democrats have voted against bills that would temporarily reopen the government as they ask Republicans to negotiate a fix to expiring tax credits for health insurance premiums purchased on the Affordable Care Act marketplace. Republicans have refused to negotiate while the government is shut down, leading to an ongoing stalemate.

In a statement Monday, Emily Hilliard, a spokesperson for HHS, blamed the impending lack of funds on Democrats. 

“More than 58,000 children are on course to lose access to Head Start funding and programs on November 1 due solely to the Democrat-led government shutdown,” she wrote.

Hilliard added that “the Trump Administration is committed to reopening the government for the American people.”

‘Collateral damage’ 

Sheridan criticized the political landscape that will likely lead to a lack of funding.

“I can’t stress enough — this is purely due to politics,” Sheridan said. “This has nothing to do with Head Start not being an effective program or people in Congress and the administration not supporting Head Start.” 

He pointed to the “strong bipartisan support” the program has received since its launch in 1965. 

“This is just us being collateral damage in a bigger fight that is going to be hurting working families and children,” Sheridan added. 

Sheridan noted that “when programs don’t have access to federal resources, generally speaking, they can try, depending on the size of the program, to stay open for a certain period of time, but they’re going to be basically using other funds, and then would be reimbursing those costs down the road, kind of like an accounting maneuver, to be able to keep their programs running.” 

He added: “That’s why we’re seeing so many programs either close or have to consider closures or things of that kind and why … we are just urging Congress and the administration to stop having children and families be the collateral damage of a political fight.”

Consequences for local Head Start programs

For programs that have to shut down because of the loss of federal funding, Sheridan pointed to several impacts.

Children would lose access to healthy meals and other resources. Families would be without affordable child care options, forcing some to quit their jobs or reduce their work hours. Community members could see economic ripple effects if staff who work in Head Start programs lose their paychecks or their jobs. 

“We also have community partners that we rely on for services, and they rely on us for business — small businesses, contractors, vendors, other small businesses, things like that — but they rely on their Head Start contracts, and if we can’t pay the bills, they’re not going to be able to count on us for what they need as well,” he said. 

Program already reeling

Under President Donald Trump’s administration, the program was already experiencing chaos prior to the government shutdown, including reports of delays in accessing approved grant funding, regional office closures and firings at HHS’ Office of Head Start.

That office also told grant recipients in March that it “will not approve the use of federal funding for any training and technical assistance (TTA) or other program expenditures that promote or take part in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.” 

A federal judge in September temporarily blocked the administration’s directive that aimed to prevent immigrants living in the United States illegally from accessing Head Start programs. 

Meanwhile, Trump’s fiscal 2026 budget request calls for maintaining Head Start funding at its prior fiscal year level of roughly $12.3 billion.

The Senate Appropriations Committee passed its annual bill to fund HHS, including Head Start, back in July and provided $12.4 billion for the program, a roughly $85 million increase.

The corresponding panel in the House also approved its bill to fund HHS in September, aligning with the administration’s request of maintaining funding for Head Start at $12.3 billion in fiscal 2026.  

Sheridan pointed out that the program has operated through challenges before, whether natural disasters, the COVID-19 pandemic, or previous government shutdowns. 

“Our programs are absolutely dedicated, hopeful and are working tirelessly to minimize that impact on children and families, but we cannot operate a program on hope and goodwill alone,” he said. “We need Congress and we need the president to come together to keep our classrooms open and also to ensure that Head Start funding can stay in line with the rising costs that we’ve seen over this last year.” 

A produce cooler at Willy Street Co-op in Madison, Wisconsin. FoodShare funding from the federal government will stop Nov. 1 if the federal government shutdown continues. (Photo by Erik Gunn/Wisconsin Examiner)

With 10 days to go until Nov. 1, the effects of the federal government shutdown are hitting closer to home in Wisconsin.

Unless the shutdown ends by that date, Wisconsin’s FoodShare program, which serves more than 700,000 Wisconsin residents — about 12% of the state’s population — will run out of funds Nov. 1, Gov. Tony Evers said Tuesday. FoodShare is funded through the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, previously known as Food Stamps.

Two Wisconsin Head Start early childhood education programs are at risk for not receiving their expected federal authorization that was to start Nov. 1, according to Jennie Mauer, executive director of the Wisconsin Head Start Association.

“Our social safety net is stretched,” Mauer said Tuesday. “This is just going to really short communities, and I think providers are bracing. We just don’t know the tidal wave that’s going to hit us, so everybody is really concerned.”

The U.S. Department of Agriculture notified states earlier this month that the SNAP program would not have enough funds to pay full benefits to the program’s 42 million participants nationwide.

The department directed states to hold off on the transactions that move SNAP funds onto the electronic benefit cards that FoodShare members use to buy groceries.

FoodShare “may not be available at all next month if the federal government shutdown continues, leaving nearly 700,000 Wisconsinites without access to basic food and groceries,” the governor’s office said in a statement Tuesday.

“President Trump and Republicans in Congress must work across the aisle and end this shutdown now so Wisconsinites and Americans across our country have access to basic necessities like food and groceries that they need to survive,” Evers said.

Both the FoodShare and Medicaid programs refer to their participants as members. “FoodShare benefits are 100 percent funded by the federal government and the shutdown will need to end before members can begin getting benefits again,” the state Department of Health Services announced in the FoodShare news page Tuesday.

If FoodShare benefits stop in November, they won’t be lost, but they will be delayed, said Matt King, CEO of the Hunger Task Force in Milwaukee. When the shutdown ends, benefits will become available again, including those not paid during the shutdown.

The Hunger Task Force supplies food pantries throughout the greater Milwaukee area. If benefits stop, food pantry operators and suppliers expect to see a sharp increase in the need for their services.

“FoodShare is the first and most critical line of defense against hunger,” King said Tuesday. “The food pantry network across Wisconsin acts as a safety net to help people in an emergency. It’s not set up to be a sustainable source of food to meet all of their grocery needs.”

While helping people get access to food in an emergency, the food pantry network also works to connect people with “more sustainable and ongoing resources like the FoodShare program,” he said.

The impending pause on FoodShare funds will compound a need that has already increased by 35% across the state in the past year, King said. “The longer the government shutdown goes on, the more strain it will put onto the emergency food system.”

Mauer of the Head Start association said two of the state’s 39 Head Start programs were to receive authorization for their next round of funding starting Nov. 1, and with them the ability to draw on their federal grants for the next several months.

So far, the authorization hasn’t been received, Mauer said. In addition, however, if the authorization is issued but the shutdown remains in effect, “there’s no money” until a budget is enacted, she added. “They need money in the coffers for [Head Start agencies] to draw down.”

The issue will repeat for programs that must reauthorize by Dec. 1 and Jan. 1 if the shutdown continues.

The remaining Head Start programs are not believed to be in peril, Mauer said, because their grants have already been funded by the previous fiscal year’s appropriations.   

The Head Start program operated by the Sheboygan Human Rights Association is one of the two awaiting its Nov. 1 reauthorization and the new round of funding that would ordinarily begin then.

“At this point, we are unsure how we will be affected,” said Theresa Christen-Liebig, the executive director of the nonprofit. The agency is using “some state funding resources to continue services until mid-November,” Christen-Liebig told the Wisconsin Examiner in an email. The agency’s board will meet next week to consider its steps for the rest of November and beyond, she said.

“The uncertainty makes the situation stressful and hard on our staff and families,” Christen-Liebig said. “We are keeping everyone updated as we try to work things out and decisions are made to continue to provide services.”

The U.S. Capitol on Oct. 9, 2024. (Photo by Jane Norman/States Newsroom)

State officials from both parties urged Congress to avoid a government shutdown Monday, though Republicans were pushing harder for an extension of current funding.

Though they sometimes clash with federal directives, states depend on funding from the federal government for numerous programs. A government shutdown, which would have a wider effect than any in recent years because Congress has not passed any of the dozen annual funding bills, would delay or cancel that support.

The National Governors Association issued a statement Monday from its chair and vice chair, Oklahoma Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt and Maryland Democratic Gov. Wes Moore, calling on Congress to come together to avoid a shutdown. The bipartisan group comprising all the nation’s governors generally avoids commenting on controversial issues that divide its membership.

“The consistent use of political brinksmanship when it comes to our government funding does not serve our states, territories or our people well,” they wrote. “It is long past time to stop kicking the can down the road and return to the regular order of debating and passing a budget, but at this juncture, Congress has a responsibility to ensure the government remains operational. We urge federal leaders from both sides to work to set aside political games and pass a budget that reflects the values and promises states commit to every day.”

While members of both parties expressed a desire to avoid a shutdown, they proposed different solutions. 

Republicans urged lawmakers to approve the “clean” continuing resolution to keep the government funded at current levels, while Democrats backed up their party’s position in Congress to seek an extension of health insurance subsidies in a funding bill.

“Allowing a shutdown would consequently and needlessly disrupt our economies, threaten public safety, and undermine public confidence in our institutions,” 25 Republican governors wrote in a Monday letter to congressional leaders. “Our families and communities would feel the pain with immediate effect and confusion.”

Partisan differences over shutdown extend beyond the Beltway

The U.S. House, where Republicans hold a majority, passed a stopgap spending measure this month, but it failed to clear the 60-vote threshold needed to pass the U.S. Senate, as Democrats have declined to support a proposal that does not address health care costs. 

At the state level, the debate has fallen along similar lines. 

“Put simply, a  government shutdown should not be used as political leverage to pass partisan reforms — these are not chips Congress should be bargaining with,” the Republican governors wrote. “The proposed budget extension is a straightforward, bipartisan solution. There are no gimmicks or partisan poison pills; it’s a clean, short-term funding measure that both parties have historically supported.”

Republican state attorneys general sent a similar letter, which noted a shutdown would affect state and local law enforcement.

Democrats throughout the country, though, echoed congressional messaging that Congress should extend the health care subsidies that were included in the 2010 health care law known as the Affordable Care Act, and take more steps to reduce the cost of health care. Republicans’ failure to include such provisions would put blame for the shutdown on the GOP, Democrats have said.

“Instead of supporting a plan that would lower costs and stop making health care more expensive, Senate Republicans are blindly following Donald Trump and pushing the country towards a devastating government shutdown,” Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, who chairs Senate Democrats’ campaign organization, said in a Sept. 19 statement.

In a press release last week, the Democratic Governors Association touted efforts by its members to call for extending subsidies.

“DGA Chair Kansas Governor Laura Kelly, Delaware Governor Matt Meyer, and New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham called on Congressional Republicans to extend critical Affordable Care Act subsidies that 22 million Americans rely on and avoid a government shutdown,” the release read. 

“Without action from Republicans in Congress, health care costs for hardworking Americans who rely on these subsidies will balloon by an average of over 75 percent.”

The National School Transportation Association named Long Island, New York contractor Suffolk Transportation as its Contractor of the Year and inducted NSTA past-president Carina Noble to its Hall of Fame during the Annual Meeting and Convention in Boston, Massachusetts.

School Transportation News is in its third year as sponsor of the NSTA Contractor of the Year award.

One of the largest school bus contractors in New York state, Suffolk Transportation Services and Suffolk Bus was established in 1955, though the company traces its origins to 1922, and was acquired in 1970 by John A. Corrado. John J. Corrado currently serves as president and CEO with his sons John R. and Joseph as assistant vice presidents. Suffolk Bus transports 62,000 students in 24 Long Island school districts each school day with 1,800 school buses over 1,500 routes.

“This award is a testament to the passion, integrity and professionalism of every member of our team,” said Thomas Smith, Suffolk’s chief operating officer. “Their dedication to safe, reliable service, a strong company culture, and leadership across the student transportation industry inspires me every day. We’re proud to stand with our fellow NSTA member companies in raising the bar for what excellence in pupil transportation truly means.”

Thomas McAteer is executive vice president and Angelo Carbone is director of the company’s transit and paratransit operations for Suffolk. 

Meanwhile, Noble joined the NSTA Hall of Fame following her term as the association’s president from 2021 to 2023. She is the senior vice president of communications for National Express, the second largest school bus contractor in North America.

NSTA credited her with helping to obtain a two-year exemption from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration for under-the-hood requirements of the school bus inspection exam needed for the commercial driver’s license and amendments to the Clean School Bus Act that now allows private contractors direct access to grants.

“Carina Noble’s impact on NSTA cannot be overstated. She has served in a variety of capacities with the organization and left us in a better place each time. As government relations committee chair, Carina was focused and determined to use our advocacy platform in a positive way,” commented NSTA Executive Director Curt Macsysn. “Personally, I have leaned on Carina for advice and support over the years, and she has always come through with her calm and reasoned approach. I’m thrilled that she is entering into the NSTA Hall of Fame, and there isn’t a more worthy recipient.”

In all, NSTA awarded 18 members and two companies during its Annual Meeting and Convention, held July 20-23. STN President and Publisher Tony Corpin joined Macysyn in presenting the magazine’s Innovator of the Year award to Guarav Sharda, chief technology officer of Beacon Mobility, for his direction and implementation of AI-based HR tools for employees. Sharda was also recognized at STN EXPO West a week earlier.

Six individuals also received NSTA Golden Merit awards for their dedication and contributions to school bus safety, community service, business practices and vehicle maintenance. They are Glenn Brayman, fleet manager for First Student in Massachusetts; Melissa Castle, a location manager for Mid Columbia Bus in Oregon; Michelle Harpenau, manager for Durham School Services in Boston, Massachusetts; Kevin Kilner, director of safety for Beacon Mobility; David Kinley, vice president of operations in New York for Student Transportation of America; and Barbie Stucker, general manager of Big Sky Bus Lines in Montana.

Distinguish Service Awards were given to Paul Mori, the New York director of client relations for Beacon Mobility and Susan Rady of Johnson School Bus Service in Wisconsin, for “significant, substantial and special contributions to pupil transportation contracting.”

NSTA Outstanding Driver Service Award Recipients went to Linda Caudillo of Mid Columbia Bus Company; Jeffrey Flitcraft of B.R. Williams in Pennsylvania, Kilra Hylton of TransAction Associates in Massachusetts, Duane Versteegh of School Bus Inc. in South Dakota, and Becky Williams of Dousman Transport Company in Wisconsin.

First Student took home the Go Yellow, Go Green Award for adopting and advancing electric school buses, which the company operates over 2,000 across North America. Tim Weaverling of insurance provider RWR-Keystone was named Committee Member of the Year while John Benjamin, president of Benjamin Bus in Minnesota was named Committee Chair of the Year. Lee Edwards of Wells Fargo Equipment Finance was awarded Vendor Partner of the Year.

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Related: Historic Year for Minnesota School Bus Contractor Punctuated by NSTA Award
Related: NSTA: The Bus Stop with Tony Corpin, Publisher, School Transportation News
Related: Update: I Squared Completes Acquisition of National Express School Bus Contracto

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