MANCHESTER, NH – U.S. Senators Maggie Hassan and Jeanne Shaheen and Congresswoman Maggie Goodlander met on Monday with New Hampshire AmeriCorps members and program directors in Manchester. The Congressional delegation discussed the importance of volunteerism and the benefits to the state of the Americorps program.
AmeriCorps is a federal agency for national service and volunteerism founded in 1993. In 2024, more than 1900 people in the Granite State of all ages and backgrounds worked for or volunteered for AmericaCorps programs.. Their members and AmeriCorps Seniors volunteers served at 233 service locations across New Hampshire.
In April, the Trump Administration cut $400 million in AmeriCorps grants, and on orders from the DOGE department, the majority of the agency’s full-time staff were dismissed. $5.2 million will be cut from the NH program, which is the majority of their $6.1 million budget.
For every federal dollar invested in NH AmeriCorps, there is an estimated $34 return on investment in benefits to our communities. That is the value of volunteers in schools, food pantries, homeless shelters, veterans programs, and even in our forests.
“These reckless cuts are hurting our communities at a time when we should be supporting national service programs that help people make a difference across our state,” said Senator Hassan.
Representatives of programs described the work they did around the state. Carol Ferlini is a retired teacher and AmeriCorps Senior who described the work of the school reading program she volunteers for. Those volunteers fill a gap in school resources and provide one-on-one learning for the most challenged students. She described the risk of losing support for the students she works with, saying, “Reading, that’s how we communicate. So if we can’t do that proficiently, then it’s going to be very hard to advance in any way, and, you know, the cost of that is huge.”
“As we heard this morning, as we were talking about what the impact of potential cuts to the AmeriCorps program would be, it’s not going to save money,” said Senator Shaheen. “What it’s going to do is downshift those costs to local communities, and it’s going to actually cost us more. So this is all a foolhardy effort.”
“It’s a cruel set of cuts, and so cruel, in the name of cutting waste, fraud, and abuse.
It just couldn’t be more dishonest,” said Congresswoman Goodlander. “It couldn’t be more lawless, and it couldn’t be more cruel because these cuts are going to hurt real people here in New Hampshire, students, our seniors, and everyone in between”.
“I will continue working with AmeriCorps members and partners from across New Hampshire to use every tool – including tireless advocacy, litigation, and legislation – to defend AmeriCorps today and for generations to come. We will not give up.”