Grant Program

Daniel Pieper, of Hunter Mill Farm in White Hall, donated a $2,500 grant he won to Penn-Mar Human Services in Freeland Tuesday, March 27. Pieper applied for the grant in December and was informed he was the Baltimore County winner of Monsanto's American Farmers Grow Communities grant program in January. The national program is sponsored by the Monsanto, an agricultural biotech company headquartered in St. Louis. Farmers who cultivate at least 250 acres and live in any of 1,245 qualified counties across the United States can apply.

After two years, the federal program providing billions of dollars to help states and districts close or remake some of their worst-performing schools remains an ambitious work in progress, with roughly 1,200 turnaround efforts under way but still no verdict on its effectiveness. The School Improvement Grant (SIG) program, supercharged by a $3 billion windfall under the federal economic-stimulus program in 2009, has jump-started aggressive moves by states and districts. To get their share of the money, they had to quickly identify some of their most academically troubled schools, craft new teacher-evaluation systems, and carve out more time for instruction, among other steps.

The Columbia Council has established a grant program of $1,000 to fund community service projects initiated by high school students who live on Columbia Association-assessed property.Up to $250 will be awarded to those projects meeting the community service criteria established by the Columbia Council.Applications and a copy of the criteria are available at high schools, village centers, the Columbia Association at 10221 Wincopin Circle and the Members Service Center at The Mall in Columbia.

Daniel Pieper, of Hunter Mill Farm in White Hall, donated a $2,500 grant he won to Penn-Mar Human Services in Freeland Tuesday, March 27. Pieper applied for the grant in December and was informed he was the Baltimore County winner of Monsanto's American Farmers Grow Communities grant program in January. The national program is sponsored by the Monsanto, an agricultural biotech company headquartered in St. Louis. Farmers who cultivate at least 250 acres and live in any of 1,245 qualified counties across the United States can apply.

A group of Pinewood Elementary School students descended on the stream next to their school yesterday afternoon. They dug holes, planted trees, and caught and released crawfish, all in an effort to learn about the environment by cleaning up the water near the Timonium school. They worked - but no one seemed to notice the heat. "We've been out in the sun for a while," 7-year-old Morgan McCanie said, "so I'm used to it now." The project was paid for through a Baltimore County school system program designed to promote environmental education.

A Baltimore City lawmaker says he will introduce legislation to give the city and other relatively poor jurisdictions a greater share of state grant dollars. Del. Keith E. Haynes, a Democrat, says he wants to change the formula of a program designed to account for differences in the ability of governments to raise revenue from local income taxes. His bill would increase the total that Baltimore City receives under the disparity grant program from $78 million to $107 million, he said. Haynes, a member of the House Appropriations Committee, said the special session set to start Oct. 29 is an "opportunity to strategically leverage this unique opportunity to fight for Baltimore."

CLAIBORNE PELL, 90 U.S. senator, creator of Pell Grants Claiborne Pell, the quirky blueblood who represented blue-collar Rhode Island in the U.S. Senate for 36 years and was the force behind a grant program that has helped tens of millions of Americans attend college, died yesterday at his Newport home after a long battle with Parkinson's disease. Mr. Pell, a Democrat, spoke with an aristocratic tone but was an unabashed liberal who spent his political career championing causes to help the less fortunate.

Federal and state officials have given a six-month reprieve to a highly touted Baltimore City Circuit Court program that was facing the ax.The community service program, which allows judges to assign nonviolent offenders to supervised public service in lieu of a jail term, was scheduled to end Jan. 1 because of the city's budget shortfall.Yesterday, state officials announced that the U.S. Justice Department has agreed to allow Maryland to use $97,000 from a federal block grant program to keep the program running through June 30. The money will be used to pay the salaries of the employees who place offenders in community work and monitor their attendance.

The Annapolis Fire Department has been awarded $225,000 in a federal grant to purchase a new fire and rescue boat that will serve the historic port and waterways of several counties, city officials announced yesterday. The funds were provided by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security under the Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program and will be combined with a $25,000 contribution from the city, said Fire Chief Michael P. Lonergan. The award is part of $750 million that was distributed through the program to departments nationwide.

In the summer of 1988, Baltimore housing officials promised to correct problems in the way a city economic development program used federal funds to provide jobs for poor people. But the promised improvements haven't happened, and now the city may be forced to repay $2 million spent by the economic development program, according to a federal report.The city's failure to properly monitor the activities of the Council for Equal Business Opportunities (CEBO) is symptomatic of a greater problem plaguing the city -- the lack of adequately trained staff to manage the estimated $21 million awarded to City Hall through the federal Community Development Block Grant Program, according to federal officials in Baltimore who oversee the block grant program.

The Maryland Hay Bank, an operation of the Mount Airy-based Gentle Giants Draft Horse Rescue, was among 15 organizations awarded a piece of $21,000 in grants this week from the Maryland Horse Industry Board. The Maryland Hay Bank assists private horse owners who are experiencing a financial hardship or a personal crisis with free hay for their horses for 30 days, up to a maximum of 100 total bales. The Maryland Hay Bank is donation driven, and hay is provided at no cost to recipients.

Jami Grant, director of the forensic science program at the University of Baltimore and mentor to many of Maryland's detectives and crime scene technicians, died Wednesday of pneumonia at a hospital in Flagstaff, Ariz. The Ruxton resident, who was traveling to the Grand Canyon when she became ill, was 51. Mel Laney, a Reisterstown resident and her companion of three years, said Dr. Grant had been in robust health until a cold developed into a rare form of pneumonia that couldn't be brought under control.

The front page story by Liz Bowie ("Race to the Top funding creates a race for the pot," Feb. 18.) shows how flippant language can trivialize and even distort information. Your writer refers to an assistant state superintendent of schools as a "behind-the-scenes bureaucrat" and hypothesizes that her work involving "statistical analysis and minutiae" would "put most of the world to sleep. " Recently, this "bureaucrat," we are told, has become a "magnet for contractors" because she has the responsibility of reviewing applications for grants funded by the federal government's Race to the Top program.

It's been a busy year so far at Powell Recovery Center in Upper Fells Point. About 40 new clients have walked into the drug treatment center since the state expanded substance-abuse coverage for low-income Maryland residents Jan. 1. State officials hope that getting more addicts into treatment will ease a major backlog, especially in Baltimore. While some centers worry that the expansion will prove burdensome, Powell Recovery's president sees only an upside: He predicts his center will be able to serve more than 2,000 drug users this year, up from 1,500 last year.

CLAIBORNE PELL, 90 U.S. senator, creator of Pell Grants Claiborne Pell, the quirky blueblood who represented blue-collar Rhode Island in the U.S. Senate for 36 years and was the force behind a grant program that has helped tens of millions of Americans attend college, died yesterday at his Newport home after a long battle with Parkinson's disease. Mr. Pell, a Democrat, spoke with an aristocratic tone but was an unabashed liberal who spent his political career championing causes to help the less fortunate.

The city has chosen major thoroughfares in three neighborhoods for a program that provides money for businesses to improve their facades and marketing strategies, officials said yesterday. Mayor Sheila Dixon announced that Hanover Street and Patapsco Avenue in Brooklyn and Harford Road through Hamilton Hills and Greater Lauraville will take part in the Baltimore Main Streets program, which grants thousands to local businesses. The grant money, which comes from the city's operating budget, pays for staff who provide technical advice to the businesses and help owners shepherd private development projects through City Hall.

WITH COLLEGE COSTS rising faster than family income and inflation, lawmakers should shore up and fully fund the federal Pell Grant program. Instead, some would gamble with the proven benefit of this tuition aid, which helps 4.8 million low-income students earn diplomas and certificates: These policy-makers would like to "improve" Pell Grants by offering only two years of aid instead of four, or by heaping on aid in the freshman year, then reducing it...

As any parent can tell you, young children incessantly ask "why?" as their rapidly developing minds begin to explore their new world. But that open-ended inquiry seems to fade as formal education, at home and in school, takes over and the rote skills of counting and memorization are stressed.So it's refreshing to see that teachers at Charles Carroll Elementary School will get a chance to discover an interpretive literature teaching program developed by the Great Books Foundation. Principal Robert Bruce is bringing the instructors here this month to explain the program to 25 elementary teachers, under a grant for educational innovation given by the Carroll school system.

A Baltimore City lawmaker says he will introduce legislation to give the city and other relatively poor jurisdictions a greater share of state grant dollars. Del. Keith E. Haynes, a Democrat, says he wants to change the formula of a program designed to account for differences in the ability of governments to raise revenue from local income taxes. His bill would increase the total that Baltimore City receives under the disparity grant program from $78 million to $107 million, he said. Haynes, a member of the House Appropriations Committee, said the special session set to start Oct. 29 is an "opportunity to strategically leverage this unique opportunity to fight for Baltimore."