Federal Update: August 2, 2019- Government Affairs (CA ...
The Federal Update for August 02, 2019From:Michael Brustein, Julia Martin, Steven Spillan, Kelly Christiansen TOC \o "1-3" \h \z \u Legislation and Guidance PAGEREF _Toc15644329 \h 1Senate Approves, President Signs Budget Deal Before Recess PAGEREF _Toc15644330 \h 1ED to Prioritize Funding for Opportunity Zones PAGEREF _Toc15644331 \h 2News PAGEREF _Toc15644332 \h 2Lawmaker Says USDA Downplaying Impact of SNAP Change PAGEREF _Toc15644333 \h 2OIG Looking to Prevent Student Aid Fraud PAGEREF _Toc15644334 \h 3Senate Confirms RSA Commissioner PAGEREF _Toc15644335 \h 4Reports PAGEREF _Toc15644336 \h 4Report Says Civil Rights Enforcement for LGBTQ Students Lagging PAGEREF _Toc15644337 \h 4 Legislation and Guidance Senate Approves, President Signs Two-Year Budget DealThe Senate on Thursday passed the budget deal agreed to by the House last week. The President signed the legislation into law Friday afternoon. The agreement raises the budget caps for fiscal years 2020 and 2021 and suspends the debt ceiling until July of 2021, averting sequestration and a potential national debt default. In addition, the agreement eliminates the threat of sequestration for any future fiscal years by allowing the law that imposed sequestration, the Budget Control Act, to expire in 2021. Earlier this week, it was unclear whether enough Senate Republicans, particularly fiscally conservative lawmakers, would vote yes on the deal, but Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-TN), Majority Whip John Thune (R-SD), and President Trump appealed to a number of senators this week, giving the legislation the support it needed to pass. The Senate has now left Washington for its month-long summer recess with plans to return on September 9th. When the Senate returns it will focus on passing all 12 appropriations bills before the end of the fiscal year. The House completed its work on appropriations in June. With only 13 days in session when lawmakers return, Senate Appropriations leaders have said that it is improbable that the chamber will be able to clear all 12 bills before September 30th, as well as reconcile the Senate legislation with the earlier-passed House bills, leaving open the possibility of a short-term spending measure or a potential government shutdown. Resources:Jennifer Scholtes, “Senate Passes Budget, Debt Ceiling Agreement for Trump’s Signature,” Politico, August 1, 2019.Author: KSCED to Prioritize Funding for Opportunity ZonesThe U.S. Department of Education (ED) published a proposed rule on Monday to create a discretionary grant priority for applicants seeking funding for use in Qualified Opportunity Zones – a program created by the 2017 tax reform law that offers tax incentives for business and real estate investors in economically disadvantaged areas. ED has the authority to establish grant priorities for discretionary programs, which provides certain applicants an advantage when seeking federal grant funding. The proposed rule published this week would provide priority for Qualified Opportunity Zones for 80 federal education grants. ED states in the notice that it is unclear precisely what the impact will be in terms of the amount of grant funds that may be shifted due to the priority. “The proposed priority would likely result in federal funds transferring from areas that are not designated as Qualified Opportunity Zones to areas that have received that designation,” the proposed rule says. “However, the Department has no way of meaningfully estimating the amount of such transfers because the number of programs that may use the proposed priority in a future grant competition is unknown, the amount of future funding available for new awards in such programs is unknown, and the number of applicants likely to apply for grants under the proposed priority is unknown.”ED is accepting public comments on the proposed rule until August 28, 2019. The proposed rule is available here.Resources:Lauren Camera, “DeVos Wants to Prioritize Education Funding for Opportunity Zones,” U.S. News, July 29, 2019.Author: KSCNews Lawmaker Says USDA Downplaying Impact of SNAP Change In a letter sent to Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue Monday, Representative Bobby Scott (D-VA), Chairman of the House Committee on Education and Labor, accused the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) of ignoring the potential impact of food stamp changes on school meals. USDA has issued new proposed regulations which would narrow eligibility for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). This is anticipated to lead to lower participation in the SNAP program generally – a change which Scott says could impact children’s eligibility for school meal programs. When households participate in SNAP, their information is sent to schools through the “direct certification” program, which automatically deems those students eligible for free meals. If their family is no longer participating in SNAP, students will not be directly certified and could lose their eligibility. Students would have to fill out a separate application for school meals instead – something their families may not know how to do – and the loss of SNAP may make it harder for those students to qualify for free meals. Additionally, Scott notes that SNAP participation is often used to calculate a school’s or district’s eligibility to participate in the Community Eligibility Program, which allows schools to provide free meals to all students in communities with lower than average household incomes.Scott says that the changes would result in 500,000 students losing eligibility for free meals – something he argues USDA should have disclosed in its proposed rule. He asks USDA for an independent calculation of the impact on students, and for the agency to publish a revised rulemaking document.Scott’s letter is available here.Author: JCMOIG Looking to Prevent Student Aid Fraud The U.S. Department of Education’s (ED’s) Office of Inspector General (OIG) is considering new efforts to prevent student aid fraud after it was made aware of a new scandal coming out of Illinois where more affluent parents are giving up legal guardianship of their teenagers in order for those teens to qualify for more student aid when applying to colleges and universities.? Since learning of this loophole, OIG has proposed changes to the federal student aid handbook to prevent further cases to defraud student aid programs.? The latest student aid scandal came to light when ProPublica and the Wall Street Journal reported on “wealthy” parents transferring legal guardianship of a child so that the child would qualify for financial aid, such as Pell grants and other State and institutional-based aid, as a low-income independent student. ?Investigative reporters said they found dozens of examples of parents living in affluent Chicago suburbs who were potentially engaged in such a scheme. ?This story broke just months after an earlier fraud scandal that involved celebrity parents bribing college officials. Catherine Grant, a spokesperson for OIG, declined to comment on any such investigation as the office does not generally confirm nor deny investigative activity in order to “protect and maintain the integrity of any possible OIG effort.”“What we can say is that we are aware of this issue and suggested to [the Office of Federal Student Aid (FSA)] that it add clarifying language to the FSA Handbook that would help close possible avenues for this type of potential student aid fraud,” Grant said in an email. ?OIG recommended adding the following language to the handbook: “If a student enters into a legal guardianship, but continues to receive medical and financial support from their parents, they do not meet the definition of a legal guardianship and are still considered a dependent student.”FSA has not specified a timeframe for making any such changes.? A new edition of the handbook is released each year, and the 2019-2020 edition is already out.? FSA may wait until the next edition before making the change, since most colleges and universities are starting their next academic year later this month.Resources:Michael Stratford, “Education IG Seeks to Curb ‘Potential Student Aid Fraud’ by Rich Parents,” Politico, July 30, 2019.Author: SAS Senate Confirms RSA Commissioner Prior to leaving for its summer recess on Thursday, the Senate confirmed Mark Schultz as Commissioner of the Rehabilitation Services Administration (RSA) at the U.S. Department of Education (ED). RSA falls under the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services at ED and oversees federal grants related to vocational rehabilitation. Schultz previously served as the Deputy Commissioner overseeing vocational rehabilitation in Nebraska and was the president of the Council of State Administrators of Vocational Rehabilitation. The Senate confirmed Schultz by a voice vote Thursday evening.Resources:Michael Stratford, “Senate Confirms Trump Pick to Lead Education’s Rehabilitation Services Unit,” Politico, August 1, 2019.Author: KSCReportsReport Says Civil Rights Enforcement for LGBTQ Students LaggingA report from the liberal policy group Center for American Progress (CAP) says that the Trump administration has scaled back its enforcement of civil rights laws as they relate to LGBTQ students. The report says that only about 2.4 percent of “LGBTQ-related complaints” to the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) currently lead to an agreement to correct alleged discrimination, compared to 22.4 percent of complaints under the previous administration. CAP’s analysis was based on a study of 573 OCR complaints filed since October 2010, which were obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request. Under the Trump administration, which adopted new guidelines for handling OCR complaints last year, the number of sexual orientation or gender-related complaints that are dismissed or closed for administrative reasons jumped from 65.4 percent to 91.5 percent. At the same time, early complaint resolutions dropped from 6.8 percent to 0.6 percent and findings of no violation or insufficient evidence to identify violations fell from 12.2 percent to 6.1 percent. In addition to the changes made to guidelines which gave investigators more leeway to dismiss claims, the U.S. Departments of Education and Justice rescinded guidance in early 2017 which had said that the sex discrimination provisions in Title IX also applied to gender identity. Instead, the administration said it would no longer pursue cases related to issues like restroom access for transgender students. The administration says that the new processes adopted last year allowed students who file complaints to be “served more efficiently and effectively” than under the previous administration. In fact, the agency says it has resolved twice the number of cases on average than under the Obama administration – a number that includes administrative closures.The CAP report is available here.Resources:Evie Blad, “Civil Rights Enforcement for LGBTQ Students Scaled Back Under Trump, Analysis Finds,” Education Week: Politics K-12, July 29, 2019.Erica L. Green, “Gay and Transgender Rights Cases Stall Under DeVos, Report Finds,” New York Times, July 29, 2019.Author: JCMTo stay up-to-date on new regulations and guidance from the U.S. Department of Education, register for one of Brustein & Manasevit’s upcoming webinars. Topics cover a range of issues, including grants management, the Every Student Succeeds Act, special education, and more. To view all upcoming webinar topics and to register, visit webinars.The Federal Update has been prepared to inform Brustein & Manasevit, PLLC’s legislative clients of recent events in federal education legislation and/or administrative law.? It is not intended as legal advice, should not serve as the basis for decision-making in specific situations, and does not create an attorney-client relationship between Brustein & Manasevit, PLLC and the reader.? Brustein & Manasevit, PLLC 2019Contributors: Julia Martin, Steven Spillan, Kelly Christiansen ................
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