The more money that’s allocated to the Lathrop Parks and Recreation Department’s scholarship fund, the more children get involved with city-sponsored programming.
And for at least the next year, that means that families that qualify as low-income based on criteria set by the Department of Housing and Urban Development will get financial assistance for everything from sports leagues and karate to soccer and gymnastics.
On Monday, the Lathrop City Council voted unanimously to approve distributing $5,000 in community development block grant funding to the department’s scholarship fund – which provides half of the normal cost of participation per child for families that meet the income requirements.
The remaining 50 percent must be paid by the families as a good faith effort.
But the allocation was not met without some controversy.
Because of changes to how the money – which the council distributes yearly to community groups and non-profits that submit requests for funding – can be dispersed, breaking up locally designated funding into increments less than $5,000, the total amount of money that Lathrop had available, is no longer allowed.
So even though the scholarship fund will be getting the full allotment of its request, regular annual recipient Give Every Child a Chance will not be getting any funding from the CDBG for the 2017/2018 year. And that didn’t sit well with Councilman Steve Dresser, who said he wanted to know how many people each of the two entities serve before committing to distribute the full allotment of funds.
According to Lathrop Parks and Recreation Director Zach Jones, the number of children that can participate in the program is historically dependent on the amount of money that is available in scholarship funds – fluctuating from $5,000 in 2014/15 to $3,000 in 2015/16 and back up slightly to $3,500 for 2016/17. All of those disbursements, totaling $11,500 over the last three allotment periods, were made with little to no advertising of the program itself other than responding to families who specifically request assistance.
Dresser, however, doesn’t want to see GECAC, which also had an advocate in Councilwoman Martha Salcedo, go without any support for the upcoming year considering that they serve youth in the Lathrop area. At his request, staff will consider whether Measure C funds can be used for non-profits that serve the community if that funding is used only for programs within the City of Lathrop – a stipulation of the one-cent sales tax increase that was approved by voters in 2012.
The council also distributed $6,724 to multi-entitlement organizations for the 2017/18 calendar year – giving $1,000 to San Joaquin County Fair Housing, $2,500 of the $5,000 request from the Second Harvest Food Bank, the full $1,500 requested by Emergency Stockton Food Bank and Mobile Farmer’s Market and $1,724 of the $2,000 requested by Meals on Wheels. Traditionally the council has distributed more of the available funding to Second Harvest Food Bank.  
Per Dresser’s request, the information about the number of people that are served by both GECAC and the parks and recreation scholarship will be provided prior to the upcoming budget cycle. Representatives from the Measure C Oversight Committee will also be involved in the discussions about where to best distribute the money if they are in fact allowed to do so.

To contact reporter Jason Campbell email jcampbell@mantecabulletin.com or call 209.249.3544.