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AmeriCorps cuts affect disability services and school tutoring programs in Albuquerque
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A class of six students, some with developmental disabilities and others with hearing loss, tapped their feet and practiced turns and fan movements during a New Mexican folklórico dance class Wednesday afternoon at the Albuquerque Sign Language Academy.
The public charter school is working to expand its offerings beyond K-12 students with adult art classes, coffee shop training and more. But the expansion was thrown for a loop when the school abruptly lost a $387,000 grant to pay for 58 AmeriCorps participants.
AmeriCorps placed 85% of its staff on administrative leave two weeks ago and last week cut $400 million in grant funds, prompting a lawsuit from two dozen states, including New Mexico. At least 11 New Mexico-based organizations lost more than $2 million in funding.
The federal agency encourages national service and volunteerism by providing cost of living stipends to volunteers who help with community projects and respond to natural disasters. Some volunteers can earn an educational scholarship through their service.
“I think sometimes AmeriCorps is billed as charity, and it’s not. It’s service. It’s service to create opportunities for others,” said Rafe Martinez, executive director of the Albuquerque Sign Language Academy.
New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez joined 23 states and the District of Columbia in a lawsuit Tuesday arguing that the Trump administration acted unlawfully in gutting AmeriCorps and effectively shuttering the agency, because AmeriCorps and its programs were created by Congress.
The White House pointed to improper payments reported by AmeriCorps, totaling more than $40 million in 2024, and attributed to insufficient documentation from grantees, calculation errors and miscoded expenses, The Associated Press reported.
“President Trump has the legal right to restore accountability to the entire Executive Branch,” Anna Kelly, White House deputy press secretary, said in an email.
The Albuquerque Sign Language Academy Foundation is resurrecting the VSA North Fourth Art Center, which closed during the COVID-19 pandemic, as a workforce development training center for adults with disabilities.
AmeriCorps provided “the opportunity for a kind of startup to get the program going again after it closed down,” said Jennifer Martinez, executive director of the Albuquerque Sign Language Academy Foundation. The Martinezes are married and their son is an academy student.
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Located directly behind the school’s playground, the North Fourth Art Center building is equipped with a theater, as well as art and dance classrooms. ASLA is gradually adding training programs in the coffee industry, flower arrangement and theater tech, as well as visual art classes. The long-term vision is to have a retail space and coffee lounge where the community and students can connect over art sales and coffee.
Some of the AmeriCorps volunteers were teaching art classes to adult students, while others were tutoring school students and reaching out to kids who never re-engaged with school after the pandemic.
Because the adult education pilot program is near its start, ASLA should be able to pivot, said Jennifer Martinez. It will look for additional funds to pay staff, but some positions filled by AmeriCorps participants will be cut.
What the AmeriCorps cuts mean in the long term for the Boys & Girls Club of Central New Mexico is still unclear. The organization utilizes AmeriCorps volunteers every year, according to CEO Colby Wilson.
The nonprofit lost $345,000 in funding for 22 AmeriCorps participants. Those volunteers were tutoring students, teaching conflict resolution and running after school programs based in 17 Albuquerque schools. They worked with 200 to 250 children, whom the nonprofit may not be able to serve next week, depending on how legal challenges to the slashed funding progress and what kind of alternate funding can be found.
“In the short term, it certainly means serving less kids, and potentially having to close some sites,” Wilson said.
Wilson has worked for Boys & Girls Club organizations for 11 years, but has never worried about funding for AmeriCorps volunteers being zeroed out before, because the program typically had bipartisan support.
Brianna Saban was notified Monday that her service through AmeriCorps at the Albuquerque Sign Language Academy was over. She was on track to receive an educational scholarship in return for her volunteer hours, money she planned to use to help one of her sons attend college. The fate of that money is unclear.
Despite AmeriCorps ending the program early, Saban is one of few volunteers able to continue her work at the school.
“I’m telling you that this matters, not just in our community here in Albuquerque, but all over the United States,” Saban said. “And to know that this funding is cut, my fellow citizens should know this was a bad decision on our administration’s part, and it’s going to affect vulnerable communities, people who matter, who are forgotten most days, and AmeriCorps was giving them support.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report. Cathy Cook covers the federal government for the Albuquerque Journal. Reach her via email at ccook@abqjournal.com.
