SPOKANE, Wash. — The City of Spokane could lose millions of dollars in federal funding that has helped fund community projects for years, from new playgrounds to helping seniors afford to stay in their homes.
President Trump’s proposed 2027 budget eliminates the Community Development Block Grant, a program that provides over $3 billion to cities across the country. Spokane has received over $7.5 million from the program in the past two years.
“To lose this funding, would start to have immediate negative impacts for our city,” said Mayor Lisa Brown.
The city recently awarded over $1 million to fund projects including a new playground at the Northeast Youth Center and a sport court at Friendship Park. These projects may be the last to receive money from the grant.
“We’ve had over 7.5 million over the last two years, and it’s gone straight into things that neighborhoods prioritized. Fencing for parks, women’s job training, home repair. These are all great things that make a difference,” Brown said.
This is not the first time the grant has faced elimination. President Trump proposed cutting the grant from the 2026 budget, but the House of Representatives decided to keep the funding for that year.
The administration says the reason for the cut is because the money is being used for pet projects and not community needs.
However, SNAP, which receives nearly $2 million a year from the grant, argues the money is needed for the Spokane community.
“Home repair for low and moderate income folks. We use them for housing default counseling. We use them also for helping people start small businesses as well,” said Julie Honekamp, CEO of SNAP.
SNAP says many of the programs help low-income households, and there’s rising demand, so the funding is needed now more than ever.
“We’ve returned to the era of having big lines. We’ve not seen that for probably ten, 12 years. So even as recent as last week, we opened energy appointments and had lines of people, you know, 6:30 in the morning waiting for an appointment,” said Honekamp.
The federal budget is scheduled to be approved by the end of September.
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