Hempstead Town Gives $5.5 Million In COVID Funding To Schools

HEMPSTEAD TOWN, NY — The Town of Hempstead announced today that it would be giving school districts within the township $5.5 million in grants to help pay for expenses the districts incurred during the coronavirus pandemic.

The town's Board of Trustees will make up to $150,000 available to each of the 36 school districts within the township, as well as Nassau BOCES. In total, the town is giving the districts $5.5 million. The money comes from the $133 million the town received from the federal CARES Act to cover coronavirus expenses.

“As the year is coming to an end, I would like to thank Senator Schumer one last time for his part in securing the funding for initiatives like this that have and continue to help tens of thousands of Hempstead residents,” said Hempstead Town Supervisor Don Clavin. “Our schools stepped up to their responsibility of educating children in spite of the challenges arisen by the pandemic. One of the challenges has been equipping the schools according to protocols to protect students, staff members and their families.”

School districts have incurred many costs in their efforts to get buildings ready to teach students during the pandemic. The grants will be used to reimburse districts for coronavirus-related expenses for things like masks, gloves, face shields, hand sanitizer, cleaning supplies, testing, desk shields and partitions.

"School administrators have made herculean efforts to keep schools open, maintain high academic quality and protect the health and safety of students, faculty, staff and the communities they serve," said Dr. Robert Dillon, the superintendent of Nassau BOCES. "This funding will help alleviate the continuously rising costs of accommodating new physical and logistical requirements, such as supplying PPE and retrofitting classrooms to facilitate social distancing implement physical barriers. Nassau BOCES will continue to advocate on behalf of our member districts, and we thank the Town of Hempstead for sharing in our mission."

The Town of Hempstead has given many grants for coronavirus expenses from the CARES Act funding it received. It has provided funds to colleges, food banks, testing programs and more. However, the town came under fire recently for allocating $60 million it received for itself. County, state and federal officials have called for the Department of Treasury to investigate the town's CARES Act expenses. Town officials called the accusations a political attack.

"If the supervisor had not refused to reimburse $50 million for Nassau’s brave first responders who answered the call in the Town of Hempstead during the first wave of the pandemic, or spent more than $50 million for new bathrooms, along with his sanitation budget and town’s general fund, then all of Nassau’s school districts would have received much needed funding from the county and in greater sums," Nassau County Executive Laura Curran said in a statement. "School districts are being thrown a proverbial bone at the very last minute, when they deserved much more, much sooner."