Pause and effect: Threat of Trump funding freeze is making the future tense for North Carolina nonprofits
by Lucas Thomae, Carolina Public Press March 26, 2025
As President Donald Trump and his appointees rifle through the country’s balance sheets looking for federal spending to slash, many North Carolina nonprofits are operating in a state of financial uncertainty, hoping they’re not the next target of the administration’s cost-cutting ambitions.
While state agencies haven’t reported any major problems accessing the federal funds that trickle down to the more than 3,000 nonprofits that receive government grants, those organizations are still behaving as if it is a possibility.
The strategy for many has been to stay quiet and avoid drawing attention to themselves.
One week after Trump took office, he issued a memo ordering all federal agencies to temporarily freeze spending on loans and grants. This was necessary, the memo stated, so that officials could review whether the agencies’ payments were aligned with Trump’s previous orders aimed at “financial assistance for foreign aid, nongovernmental organizations, DEI, woke gender ideology and the green new deal.”
The vague memo sent shockwaves through Washington, confusing agencies and angering members of Congress across the political spectrum.
The memo directed that Medicare and Social Security benefits be unaffected by the freeze. But the White House later had to clarify that other programs such as Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, colloquially known as food stamps) would also remain untouched.
Two days later, the memo was rescinded altogether.
Lawsuits over the legality of the freeze are ongoing. However, the message to organizations receiving federal money was clear:
Anyone not in lockstep with the Trump agenda risks having their government dollars taken away.
Nonprofit decisions made ‘difficult’
Since 2020, the federal government has funnelled $200 billion into North Carolina through grants and subgrants — funding awarded from an agency to a smaller agency or organization, which is then further distributed to more modest awardees.
The awardees who receive the bulk of federal grants typically fall into one of three categories: state government agencies, universities and hospitals.
None of those types of institutions are at acute risk of being crippled by the revocation of federal funding.
Small nonprofits, however, are worried. Especially those whose values directly contradict the conservative cultural ideology of the Trump administration.
State agencies, such as the N.C. Department of Public Safety, haven’t reported any major problems accessing the federal funds that trickle down to the more than 3,000 nonprofits that receive government grants. Lucas Thomae / Carolina Public Press
Carolina Public Press reached out to a plethora of state-based nonprofits to ask how they were dealing with financial uncertainty in the wake of the funding freeze. The missions of those organizations ranged from providing affordable childcare to advancing creative arts education to supporting victims of violent crime.
Not many organizations were willing to speak openly — or even anonymously.
“With the climate being rather delicate currently, we are not comfortable commenting on the federal funding and grants situation,” said the communications directorof a nonprofit that provides services to the children of migrant workers in North Carolina and several other states.
Other nonprofits who declined to be interviewed or did not respond to CPP’s inquiry at all included the North Carolina Victim Assistance Network, the LGBTQ Center of Durham and Help, Incorporated: Center Against Violence.
Each of those organizations received federal funding last year that originated from the U.S. Department of Justice and was intended to fund programs to support victims of domestic violence and other violent crime.
The strategy for many nonprofits has been to not attract attention in the hopes that they can continue to operate without much trouble.
Other organizations, such as the United Arts Council of Raleigh and Wake County (United Arts), have already seen their federal grants become threatened.
United Arts works closely with Wake County Public Schools to provide students with creative arts experiences, and the organization also awards annual subgrants to local artists to support their projects.
The National Endowment for the Arts recently awarded United Arts a $50,000 grant for distributionto local artists, but that award is now “under review,” United Arts CEO Jenn McEwen announced in February.
“The odds of our NEA grant being rejected in the review process is high,” McEwen said.
In order to offset that potential loss, United Arts urged its supporters for donations.
“Beyond our organization, many of our grantees — small nonprofit arts organizations — are already facing difficult financial decisions,” United Arts public relations manager John Craven told CPP in an email. “Some are scaling back on programs that support their mission but are not central to their signature or flagship offerings as they navigate the uncertainty around federal, state and local funding.
“The combined pressures of this funding uncertainty and economic instability are making it increasingly difficult for these organizations to plan for the future.”
Counting the costs for nonprofits
There are around 10,000 nonprofit organizations in North Carolina. A recent analysis from the nonprofit research center Candid found that 9,946 organizations filed a full 990 tax form at least once between 2021 and 2023.
Of those organizations, just over one third reported receiving at least one government grant in their most recent tax filing.
All in all, North Carolina nonprofits received more than $7 billion from the government through grants.
The Urban Institute, a think tank based in Washington, D.C., further analyzed nonprofit grant data and broke it down at the county level. Researchers found that the organizations in rural regions of the state benefit most from government funding.
The analysis further indicated that nonprofits in rural counties such as Anson, Jones and Northampton would have the biggest financial gap to fill if the Trump administration cost them government grants.
All of the nonprofits in eight North Carolina counties — Anson, Gates, Martin, Montgomery, Perquimans, Person, Sampson and Stokes — would have operating deficits if their government grants were taken away. That’s 46 nonprofits in all.
In 98 of North Carolina’s 100 counties, at least half of the nonprofits would experience an operating deficit if not for their government funding.
As far as subsectors go, the financial uncertainty that comes with the potential loss of government funding is indiscriminate. The Urban Institute found that 75% of education nonprofits, 73% of human services nonprofits and 64% of arts nonprofits in the state would operate in the red without their government grants.
Hospitals and nonprofits related to religion and the environment had the smallest share of organizations reliant on government funding, although that number was still north of 40%.
A ‘fluid’ situation
Although nonprofits are preparing to potentially lose grant money from the Trump funding freeze, that hasn’t been the reality yet.
Two of North Carolina’s most important pass-through funding agencies — the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Public Safety — told CPP they’ve made all scheduled payments to subgrant recipients this year.
Both award millions of dollars worth of subgrants to nonprofits across the state each year.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services said that the agency had experienced unexpected delays to some federal payouts, although they were eventually received.
“There have been instances when payments were unexpectedly delayed as well as isolated payments that were under review by federal counterparts for a short period of time,” the spokeswoman said.
The Health and Human Services grants that were put under federal review included money intended to support mental health services and substance-abuse treatments.
At the same time, neither agency denied that they experienced complications related to the federal funding freeze.
“Presently, (the Department of Public Safety) is not having difficulty accessing funding,” a spokeswoman told CPP in an email last week. “The situation is fluid, and we will continue to monitor our ability to drawdown our federal reimbursements and adjust or modify our operations as necessary.”
When will Helene-damaged Broadmoor Golf Course be ready for play? FernLeaf Charter School back in business in previously flooded location? • Asheville Watchdog
The Broadmoor Golf Course near Asheville Regional Airport, owned by the airport and leased to DreamCatcher Hotels, suffered over $10 million in flood damage from Tropical Storm Helene. DreamCatcher is rebuilding the course, clubhouse, and maintenance buildings using insurance and company funds, aiming to reopen in spring 2026. Meanwhile, FernLeaf Community Charter School in Fletcher, flooded by Helene, reopened its elementary Creek Campus after nearly a year with new modular buildings. Despite challenges, including ongoing construction and flooding risks, the school rebuilt on its original site with community support and flood insurance, celebrating resilience and continued education.
Today’s round of questions, my smart-aleck replies and the real answers:
Question: The Broadmoor Golf Course near the airport suffered catastrophic damage during the floods of Helene. Only the driving range has been able to operate. But now there is great activity that looks like the course is being rebuilt. I think the property belongs to the airport, and it is contracted out for management. Who is paying for this work, and when might the course be ready again for play?
My answer: I do miss playing this course, mainly because it’s not often I get a chance to hit a wayward shot onto an interstate, in this case I-26. Usually my drives are confined to the woods or a simple two-lane road.
Real answer: In short, a lot is going on at Broadmoor, which is located off Airport Road about a mile from Asheville Regional. The airport does own the property, but it leases the golf course to a company, DreamCatcher Hotels, which operates the golf course and plans to build a hotel on the property.
Zeke Cooper, president and CEO of DreamCatcher, told me his company has a 50-year lease, and it is committed to site improvements.
“As always planned, we are developing a hotel on the property, which we plan to start site work on later this year,” Cooper said via email.
Tropical Storm Helene inundated the Broadmoor Golf Links course, causing over $10 million in damage. // Photo provided by DreamCatcher Hotels
Helene, which struck our area Sept. 27, inundated the golf course and clubhouse. The French Broad River is close by, and the property is, as the name implies, relatively flat.
“The golf course lost over 1,000 trees and had 12-18 inches of silt covering 60-70 percent of the course,” Cooper said. “The first step was to remove all of the tree debris and remove the silt.”
The company finished that in April, and golf course reconstruction started shortly thereafter.
“The clubhouse had two feet of water on the first floor, with the basement completely submerged,” Cooper said. “The maintenance and irrigation buildings were submerged, resulting in total losses of the buildings and all equipment within them. It was a mess!”
Fortunately, they did have flood insurance. Cooper said total damage exceeded $10 million.
“So a lot of the work is being paid for with insurance funds, as well as our own money,” Cooper said. “We do not have an opening date yet, but expect to reopen in spring of 2026.”
For the golfers out there, Cooper gave a detailed breakdown of all the work they’re doing:
On the golf course: Stripping all greens surfaces, adding in new greens mix and reseeding with bent grass. All greens are completed and currently growing in. The 11th green was completely destroyed, as well as some tee boxes. Those have been rebuilt and are growing in.
All of the fairways and tees have been stripped of silt, regraded and tilled. All of these areas are currently growing in with Bermuda grass.
All of the bunkers were stripped, regraded and rebuilt with new drainage and sand. Sod was used around every greens complex and all bunkers, with the work completed about a month ago.
Tropical Storm Helene left behind 12 to 18 inches of silt on the Broadmoor Golf Links course in the Fletcher area. Workers had it removed by April, and the company that operates the course is rebuilding. // Photo provided by DreamCatcher Hotels
The irrigation electrical system was destroyed, and has now been replaced. New irrigation pumps have been operational the last couple of months. Workers also had to clean out and replace drainage systems, along with lots of bank restabilization.
Driving range: “We were able to open the driving range in a temporary capacity while work was being undertaken on the course,” Cooper said. “We closed the range on Aug. 11, in order to fix damage from the flood. It is currently under construction and we hope to reopen it in the next three to four months. No timetable, yet, as it’s weather dependent this late in the season.”
Clubhouse, maintenance buildings: The company gutted, cleaned and rebuilt the clubhouse. “We are close to hopefully reopening the clubhouse and restaurant in the next two months,” Cooper said. “We are working on finalizing some construction items for a full Certificate of Occupancy, as well as waiting on furniture, fixtures and equipment.”
The maintenance and irrigation buildings are completed and in use, Cooper added.
Question: What is going on with the FernLeaf Community Charter School in Fletcher? I’ve seen they’re putting back in mobile classrooms in the area that flooded, and it looks like it’s close to reopening. I thought they moved all the students to their location further south that sits on top of a hill?
My answer: I suspect all of the new mobile classrooms are actually barges. Pretty ingenious, really.
Real answer: Back in April I wrote about FernLleaf, the flooding at its location off Howard Gap Road in Fletcher, and the school’s plans to rebuild. Helene’s floodwaters filled the buildings with up to six feet of water and swept some of them off their foundations, Nicole Rule, communications, marketing and events coordinator for the school, said then.
On Monday she had some happy news about FernLeaf’s “second act.”
FernLeaf Community Charter School, which sustained major damage at its “Creek Campus” elementary school location in Fletcher, has reopened with new modular buildings. // Photo by Nicole Rule of FernLeaf Charter School.
“On Aug. 13, FernLeaf Community Charter School in Fletcher reopened its Creek Campus — 321 days after Hurricane Helene’s catastrophic flooding swept our main buildings off their foundations and left the campus under several feet of water,” Rule said via email. “In that time, over 430 elementary students and their teachers relocated to our Wilderness Campus (previously home to middle and high schoolers), where they continued learning without missing a beat.”
Rule said, “Community partners, including general contractor Beverly Grant and even the Carolina Panthers Charities (with a $20,000 grant), rallied to help us rebuild.
“While one building is still under construction due to this summer’s unrelenting rain, the reopening marks a milestone for our students, families, and the broader Fletcher/Asheville community,” Rule said. That building should be ready by the end of September.
Michael Luplow, FernLeaf’s executive director, said the school’s “journey has been a powerful demonstration of what we can achieve when we come together.”
“We are immensely grateful for the unwavering support of our students, families, staff, and the broader community,” Luplow said in the press release. “The re-opening of the Creek Campus is not just about a new set of buildings; it is a celebration of our collective spirit and our enduring mission to provide an innovative, inspiring education to our students.”
By the way, FernLeaf did rebuild on the same footprint, which is close to Cane Creek. But this is all approved.
“Since Fern Leaf had previously been constructed in a manner that met our current elevation requirements, they are permitted to go back in at the same elevation,” Town of Fletcher Planning Director Eric Rufa told me in April. “I have encouraged them to go higher, but current circumstances with regard to grade and ADA requirements may hinder that.”
The school did have flood insurance.
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Asheville Watchdog is a nonprofit news team producing stories that matter to Asheville and Buncombe County. Got a question? Send it to John Boyle at jboyle@avlwatchdog.org or 828-337-0941. His Answer Man columns appear each Tuesday and Friday. The Watchdog’s reporting is made possible by donations from the community. To show your support for this vital public service go to avlwatchdog.org/support-our-publication/
Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.
Political Bias Rating: Centrist
The content presents factual information about local community issues, such as flood damage and rebuilding efforts at a golf course and a charter school, without expressing partisan opinions or advocating for a particular political ideology. The tone is neutral and focused on reporting details relevant to the community, reflecting a balanced and nonpartisan approach.
SUMMARY: Brooke Johnson, 29, became the first woman to skateboard across the U.S., completing a nearly four-month, 3,000-mile journey from Santa Monica, California, to Virginia Beach. Motivated by a promise to her late stepfather, Roger, who suffered a spinal cord injury and encouraged her to skate across the country, Brooke fulfilled her goal while raising over $54,000 for spinal cord research. Despite emotional and physical challenges, she felt Roger’s support throughout. At the finish line, she wore a necklace containing his ashes, symbolizing their shared journey. Brooke plans to rest before deciding her next adventure. Donations continue via “Brooke Does Everything.”
Brooke Johnson traveled by skateboard from California to Virginia Beach over 118 days to raise over $50000 for spinal cord injury …
www.thecentersquare.com – By Alan Wooten | The Center Square – (The Center Square – ) 2025-08-18 08:01:00
Hurricane Erin, which rapidly intensified from Category 1 to Category 5 over the weekend with winds near 160 mph, weakened slightly to Category 4 on Monday while remaining offshore. At 8 a.m., it was about 115 miles north-northeast of Grand Turk and 890 miles south-southeast of Cape Hatteras, moving northwest at 13 mph. Dare County declared an emergency, ordering evacuations for Hatteras Island and the Outer Banks, where NC 12 is at risk of flooding and damage. While Erin is expected to miss U.S. landfall, North Carolina’s coast remains within its wind field amid ongoing recovery from Hurricane Helene.
(The Center Square) – Erin, once a Category 5 hurricane over the weekend that more than doubled wind speed to nearly 160 mph, on Monday morning remained on a path to miss landfall of the United States though not without forcing evacuations in North Carolina.
At 8 a.m., the Category 4 hurricane was just east of the southeastern Bahamas, the National Weather Center said, about 115 miles north-northeast of the Grand Turk Islands, and about 890 miles south-southeast of Cape Hatteras. Erin was moving northwest at 13 mph, forecast to be going north by Wednesday morning while parallel to the Florida panhandle.
Erin had 75 mph maximum winds Friday at 11 a.m., a Category 1, and 24 hours later was near 160 mph and Category 5. It has since gone to a Category 3 before gaining more intensity.
On the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale, Category 1 is 74-95 mph, Category 2 is 96-110, Category 3 is major and 111-129 mph, Category 4 is 130-156 mph, and Category 5 is greater than 157 mph. While the most-often characterization of Atlantic basin cyclones, the scale is without context on storm surge – a key factor in damage at landfall.
Dare County on Sunday declared an emergency with evacuations ordered for Hatteras Island and the Outer Banks. N.C. 12, the famed 148-mile roadway linking peninsulas and islands of the Outer Banks, is likely to go under water and parts could wash away – as often happens with hurricanes.
NC12 begins at U.S. 70 at the community of Sea Level and runs to a point just north of Corolla and south of the Currituck Banks North Carolina National Estuarine Research Reserve. Two ferries, Hatteras Island to Ocracoke Island and Cedar Island to Ocracoke Island, are part of the route.
Nearly all of North Carolina’s 301-mile coastline is within the outer wind field projection from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Hurricane Center. The greatest speed, however, is 20 mph.
Erin’s rapid intensity is among the greatest on record, and particularly so for prior to Sept. 1. Hurricane force winds (74 mph) extend 60 miles from its center.
By midnight Thursday into Friday, the storm is expected to be past a point parallel to the Virginia-North Carolina border and gaining speed away from the coast.
The storm’s miss of the state is particularly welcome in light of Hurricane Helene. Recovery from that storm is in its 47th week. Helene killed 107 in the state, 236 across seven states in the South, and caused an estimated $60 billion in damage to North Carolina.
Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.
Political Bias Rating: Centrist
The content provided is a straightforward news report on Hurricane Erin, focusing on meteorological facts, evacuation orders, and recent hurricane impacts in North Carolina. It presents detailed information about the storm’s strength, projected path, and historical context without expressing any opinion or advocating for a particular political viewpoint. The language is neutral and factual, offering updates from official sources and avoiding ideological framing. Thus, it reports on the situation without contributing any discernible political bias or ideological stance.
