Lacey human services panel debates how to divide $300,000 in city grants; votes to revisit on July 10

The City of Lacey Human Services Commission reviewed staff recommendations and debated how to distribute a $300,000 city-funded human services grant pool among 20 nonprofit applicants on June 26, ultimately voting to table a final funding recommendation until a July 10 meeting.

Michelle Chavez, human services staff, told commissioners, “we had 20 applications from 20 agencies … a total ask of $841,761 for a total allocation of $300,000,” and summarized staff’s analysis of scores, priority areas and six allocation options presented to the commission.

The grant program uses three city priorities: housing, survival and security. Chavez said five applicants emphasized housing needs, four emphasized survival, two emphasized security, and most proposals covered multiple priorities. The city set a $50,000 maximum award per application; no capital projects were submitted this year.

Staff outlined two recommended approaches that commissioners focused on. Option 2 would fund every applicant scoring 90 or above with $25,000 each (12 agencies under the current scores). Option 3 would award funding by scored percentile — for example, the highest tier would receive roughly 65% of their request, the next tier 33% and a lower tier 16% — resulting in funding for about 16 agencies but substantially smaller awards for some applicants.

Commissioners debated trade-offs repeatedly: awarding larger sums to the top-scoring agencies so they can meet program goals versus spreading smaller awards more widely so more local organizations receive some support. Tiffany Walker, a commissioner and rapid rehousing program manager, said, “for me, option 2 looks the best,” arguing higher awards better enable organizations to meet the needs they described in presentations.

Other commissioners urged concern for smaller or newer organizations whose grant-writing capacity may be limited and whose programs could be imperiled by no funding. One commissioner proposed a hybrid not included in the staff packet: lower the top-tier award slightly so remaining funds could be split among several lower-ranked applicants (one example discussed would allocate $22,000 to the top 12 and distribute the remainder as $9,000 awards to four others).

Staff told the commission that if any of the options left unallocated money, the city council could either carry the funds forward to the next budget cycle or reassign them; Michelle Chavez said the commission could recommend how any leftover dollars be reallocated but that final decisions rest with the council.

After more than an hour of discussion about impact, equity, and the commission’s scoring rubric, Vice Chair Angelina Goldwell moved to table the decision for further review with the intent to reconvene on July 10. Goldwell said she wanted commissioners to “rereview the documents, gone into our separate corners, done all the thinking that we needed to do,” before returning with a recommendation. Lester Dixon seconded the motion. The motion passed on a voice vote; no roll-call tally was recorded.

The commission’s recommendation will go to the Lacey City Council for its review; staff said meeting the July council timeline is possible if the commission finalizes a recommendation at the July 10 meeting.

The discussion underscored that housing-related programs received the highest scores and that commissioners saw housing as the area likely to receive the largest share of any awards, but the group did not finalize allocations on June 26.