The city’s Community Action Partners agency announced at an April 16 meeting it is still awaiting $600,000 in federally frozen community services block grant funds that were originally to be disbursed in July 2025.
The agency, part of the city’s Neighborhood Services department, serves as Fort Worth’s community action arm for the city as well as Tarrant County, providing comprehensive services to low-income people, such as utility bill assistance, employment resources and help for senior citizens.
These efforts are funded by federal community services block grants and comprehensive energy assistance program funds.
Nationally, community services block grant funds account for approximately $755 million annually. In addition to the impoundment of current-year funds by the federal government, the fiscal year 2027 federal budget proposes eliminating the funds entirely, the city staff said.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said community services block grants are designed “to implement community-based services to reduce poverty, revitalize communities, and help people with low incomes become self-sufficient.”
Comprehensive energy assistance program funds are also administered by that department, providing assistance with home energy bills, weatherization and other energy-related home repairs.
Community Action Partners uses a small percentage of the federal block grant — less than 10% — for administrative costs such as salaries. The remainder is dedicated to services for the public.
Despite the funding crisis, Community Action Partners has about $131,000 to continue its programs through October, the staff said.
Community Action Partners council members pledged to write to their representatives to urge them to lobby for the release of the funds. However, on April 23, 2026, Health and Human Services announced that allocations for the second and third quarters were being released. It was not clear how much of the $600,000 frozen funds are affected.
Despite this, fiscal year 2027 funding remains in doubt.
It was also announced the 15-member board has five open seats. One is for a low-income community member; the other four are for representatives of community service agencies. The city said no plans exist to announce the vacancies, although the board could approve an announcement.
Fort Worth Community Action Partners Council Meeting
Documenter name: Patrick Banis
Date: April 16, 2026
To learn more about this meeting, click here. For the agenda, click here.
Patrick Banis is a member of the Fort Worth Report Documenters crew. If you believe anything in this account is inaccurate, please email us at news@fortworthreport.org with “Correction Request” in the subject line.
This <a target=”_blank” href=”https://fortworthreport.org/2026/05/02/fort-worths-community-action-partners-awaits-600k-in-federal-funds/”>article</a> first appeared on <a target=”_blank” href=”https://fortworthreport.org”>Fort Worth Report</a> and is republished here under a <a target=”_blank” href=”https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/”>Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License</a>.<img src=”https://i0.wp.com/fortworthreport.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/cropped-favicon.png?resize=150%2C150&quality=80&ssl=1″ style=”width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;”>
<img id=”republication-tracker-tool-source” src=”https://fortworthreport.org/?republication-pixel=true&post=521693&ga4=2820184429″ style=”width:1px;height:1px;”><script> PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: “https://fortworthreport.org/2026/05/02/fort-worths-community-action-partners-awaits-600k-in-federal-funds/”, urlref: window.location.href }); } } </script> <script id=”parsely-cfg” src=”//cdn.parsely.com/keys/fortworthreport.org/p.js”></script>