Education commissioner says $30 million in ARPA maintenance funds will be managed locally as federal grantee role shifts

Commissioner Deionne Wells Hedrington told the Legislature’s Committee on Budget, Appropriations and Finance that about $30 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds have been assigned to maintenance-related projects and will be managed on the local side by the bureau of construction and maintenance.

“The bureau has its own budget on the local side. They are managing some of our ARPA projects, which were recently granted permission to move forward,” Wells said. She added that roughly $30,000,000 of ARPA funds are for maintenance-related projects.

Wells told senators the U.S. Department of Education does not formally recognize the local bureau as a separate grantee. “Any funding that is granted to the territory will be given to the Department of Education as the grantee, and then we would have to make arrangements internally to facilitate any projects,” she said, describing the current operational arrangement.

Wells said the administration and the territory’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) are discussing a larger federal shift. She described meetings with the U.S. secretary of education and said the federal department “now wants to move all of the jurisdiction of federal funding to the states,” which would require OMB to create an internal arm to manage funds and reduce reliance on a third-party intermediary.

The commissioner said the bureau will execute approximately $30 million of ARPA projects, and that, before the administration change, there was about $8.9 million of invoices queued for payment. “Once we have the go-ahead from OMB and Department of Finance, then we will be able to push through the invoices that have been sitting there for payment,” she said.

Senators pressed for timelines on a full transition to local management; Wells said she had no firm schedule. “Once that’s in place, I think we will be able to transition, but timelines I don’t have,” she said.

The exchange clarified two practical points for lawmakers: ARPA-authorized projects are being executed by the local bureau, but federal grant awards continue to be routed through the Department of Education as grantee while the territory negotiates OMB-level changes.

Wells also acknowledged the operational challenge of moving positions and costs back onto the local budget now that ARPA funds have expired. “A lot of the day to day operations of the department was placed on the ARP to help ease up the local funding and now have to be returned,” she said.

The committee did not take formal action in the hearing; senators requested additional documentation on outstanding drawdowns and asked staff to follow up with OMB and Department of Finance.