Planned schoolyard overhaul in Tacoma on pause with anticipated federal funding cut
Federal money awarded to a Tacoma public school for schoolyard upgrades appears to be among U.S. government cancellations of various grants issued during the Biden administration.
On Friday, The News Tribune reported on the loss of a $1 million grant awarded from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department for wildfire prevention/education for portions of Pierce County.
Also among the 10 Washington programs to receive funding in that 2023 EPA award cycle was Tacoma Public Schools. That $1 million grant was for a project described in the funding announcement as work “to transform an outdated schoolyard at Larchmont Elementary into a vibrant green space.”
Internal EPA documents released by the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works include a list of about 400 grants totaling more than $1.7 billion targeted for elimination. The list included the Larchmont program, listed as “Environmental Justice at Larchmont Elementary.”
Kathryn McCarthy is assistant director of communications for Tacoma Public Schools. In response to questions from The News Tribune, McCarthy said via email that the district had not yet received any letter from the EPA regarding the Larchmont funding, “but expect it is forthcoming.”
Unlike other projects that received money at the time, McCarthy said the schools’ project had not begun.
“Work was slated to start this spring and ramp up over the summer to minimize disruption to student learning,” she wrote. “As work has not commenced, we have not accessed our grant funds.”
McCarthy added, “Given policy signals from EPA Administrator (Lee) Zeldin, volume of termination letters issued to other grantees, and the high number of grantees who have found their funds frozen mid-project, our project remains on pause.”
The 10 projects in Washington state originally totaled $8.2 million and were described by the agency as environmental-justice projects, aimed to “ensure disadvantaged communities that have historically suffered from underinvestment have access to clean air and water and climate resilience solutions.“
The Trump administration has sought to roll back and cancel previous environmental-justice programs, with the current EPA labeling such spending as “wasteful.”
In a letter to the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department, the agency determined that its wildfire program “no longer effectuates the program goals or agency priorities. The objectives of the award are no longer consistent with EPA funding priorities.”
Congressional Democrats have contended the terminations are unlawful, and various other grant cancellations are being challenged in court.
In 2023, The News Tribune reported on how Larchmont was among five school sites in a pilot program that aimed to boost public green space settings in different areas of Tacoma to increase the percentage of Tacoma residents living within a 10-minute walk of a public park.
Larchmont would be the last of five revamped community schoolyards. Sites at Helen B. Stafford Elementary and Jennie Reed Elementary are open, while Whitman Elementary and Mann Elementary are scheduled for openings this spring.
According to the national nonprofit Trust for Public Land, a partner in the project, Tacoma has the largest park-access gap of any major city in Washington state. Its online page describing the project noted that the Larchmont project would benefit 370 students and that 1,102 residents live within a 10-minute walk of the site.
Parks Tacoma, another project partner, describes the current schoolyard property on its website as “a simple playground, a well-worn natural turf field, and vacant grassy area. The grassy area represents a multitude of opportunities to bring the community’s vision to life for this play space.”
In response to questions, Parks Tacoma said in a statement, “We’re disappointed at the prospect that this project may not move forward in such an underserved community. Larchmont Community Schoolyard would meet both a need for children to have a safe playground and for roughly 1,100 people to have a park within a 10-minute walk of their home.”
With the Larchmont program paused, other sources for funding will need to be considered.
“We expect that we, with our partners Parks Tacoma and Trust for Public Land, will need to identify alternative funding sources to bring the Larchmont schoolyard park project to life,” McCarthy wrote.
