Community Options to Fund Aging Services: A National Study to Track Local Initiatives

The majority of federal support for older people needing in-home services and supports comes from the Medicaid program. However, less than 10% of older people are eligible for Medicaid and to receive long-term services, a person must have a severe disability. Many older people with moderate levels of disability or those who are not impoverished are not eligible. In response to these system limitations, some counties across the nation have developed alternative funding strategies, such as property tax levies, to better serve older members of their communities. After identifying 15 states with such initiatives, a survey was distributed to 414 contacts within these states, with a response rate of 55%. Respondents included organizations such as area agencies on aging, councils on aging, and county departments on aging. Local funding varied within and across states, with annual funding ranging from $8,000-$47 million. Most commonly provided services with local funds include home-delivered (81%) and congregate (73%) meals, transportation (61%), and homemaker services (49%). A majority of programs (63%) indicated that local funds are used to provide at least one family or friend caregiver service. This study is the first compilation and description of locally-funded elder service initiatives in the U.S. Locally-funded initiatives can help older people with long-term services needs continue to live in their own homes and communities. On the other hand, some have raised questions about whether this is a good approach to funding aging services, raising concerns that this will lead to further inequities across states and communities.

Political Gold: The Australian Sports Grants Scandal

The partisan allocation of public funds has a long history in Australian politics. Using a unique dataset, which allows us to distinguish the merit-based component of the funding decision from the politically based component, we examine the 2018–2019 Australian sports grants scandal. We find that local funding allocations for sports infrastructure were directed disproportionately to win marginal electorates and to reward loyal supporters. However, contrary to our expectations, we find virtually no electoral impact of the grants: those electorates that received more sporting grant funding were no more likely to swing in favour of the government in the 2019 election than electorates that received no funding. A straw poll of members of the House of Representatives suggests one possible explanation as to why pork-barrelling persists: parliamentarians tend to overestimate its electoral impact.

How to Reform Without Reforming: School District Racial Composition and Pennsylvania’s “Fair” Funding Formula

In the United States, researchers have documented persistent racial disparities in school funding for decades. Drawing on evidence from a recent policy change in Pennsylvania, this article contributes to research on the role of state governments in limiting or expanding racial disparities in K-12 education funding by examining differences in the racial composition of school districts positively and negatively impacted by a technical provision lawmakers inserted into a newly created formula for distributing state equalization aid. We find that negatively-impacted districts enroll a substantially higher number of Black and Latinx students, receive less state aid, have lower levels of state and local funding, and have lower spending levels than positively-impacted districts with otherwise similar financial needs. These findings suggest how state lawmakers can exacerbate racial inequities when pursuing reforms ostensibly focused on equity, and these results have implications for both policymakers and educational leaders focused on racial justice.

Financial Activity of Rural «Prosvits» of the Right-Bank Ukraine (1920–1922)

The purpose of the article is to analyze the financial situation of rural «Prosvit» on the territory of the Right Bank of Ukraine in 1920–1922. On the basis of mainly archival materials, the authors find out the problems and achievements of educators in financial activities, the influence of the Soviet regime on it, its consequences. The research methodology is based on a combination of general scientific methods (comparison, generalization, analysis) with interdisciplinary (structural-system method). The main methods during the preparation of the publication were historical-comparative, synchronous, statistical. The application of these methods helped to clarify the whole set of aspects related to the scientific problem. The scientific novelty of the work is that using the methods of analysis of historical documents, the authors analyze the impact of the financial situation of educational societies on their cultural and educational work in the first years of the Soviet regime. For the first time in Ukrainian historiography the peculiarities of the financial activity of rural «Prosvit», its role in the formation and development of societies are clarified. Conclusions. The financial activity of the rural «Prosvits» of the Right Bank of Ukraine in 1920–1922 is an important component of their functioning. It determined the development of societies as well as the cultural and educational level of the peasants. «Prosvit's» financial activities were significantly influenced by local conditions and state aid. The educators organized various events to increase their budget and spend money only when needed. The financial activities of the rural «Prosvit» were under the total control of the Soviet regime. When the regime's attempts to turn educational institutions into «pocket» organizations became apparent, they were transferred to local funding and liquidated.

School Capital Expenditure Rules and Distribution

We provide descriptive evidence on the level and within-state distribution of school capital expenditures over the past two decades. We relate these to the fiscal institutions governing capital funding across states. Within-state differences in capital expenditures between the highest-and lowest-income school districts fell considerably following the Great Recession. Spending declined in the highest-income districts, while state support for low-income districts remained stable. Suggestive evidence points to the importance of constraints on districts' ability to raise local funding and the structure of state support in explaining these differences and trends over time.

الموجهات الإرشادية لإعداد الدراسات التفصيلية وتحديد خطوات تنفيذ المشاريع من أجــــل قيام مشاريع ناجحة من الفكرة الى التشغييل

This paper was prepared to introduce the importance of knowledge and awareness by adhering to international standards when establishing large economic projects (> 1.0 m $) through preparing a detailed feasibility study. This includes all stages of the project (from idea to operation) and identifies project outputs and indicators of success, in order to establish best projects and for the optimal use of public money, based on a comparison and clarification with some successful projects to benefit from their experience. In fact, most projects in the Sudan are not studied and implemented according to a disciplined professional hierarchy and international standards, which often leads to their failure. Therefore, defining this problem and describing the solution should be a professional duty, the greater of which is located in the economic, engineering, the administrative, and the executive sectors, but the opinion of the civil engineer still remains as a key factor from the idea to the operational (Rule of Thumb). To solve this problem, we proposed simple guidelines for establishing projects from the idea to the operating, benefiting from our experience with the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning and the Islamic Development Bank, and guidelines from consultant homes and financing institutions in this regard. Finally, we think that our suggested guidelines can be used as basic platform for all those involved and those in charge of these projects, so that the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (the largest financier) can end up as binding directors (along the lines of purchase and contracting laws and regulations) to obtain the funding required to implement projects public financed with loans or grants by global or local funding agencies.

Digitizing Archives in Russia: Epistemic Sovereignty and Its Challenges in the Digital Age

The chapter discusses the production of digital archives in Russia as part of a complex political economy of historical knowledge. Several high-profile digital archives have been produced within the framework of grant funding provided by international agencies and commercial content providers and have reflected the priorities of the funding organizations by focusing on state violence in Russia and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), international Communist movement, as well as other politicized or easily monetized content. At the same time, national and regional archives in Russia also engaged in the digitization of their collections by soliciting federal and local funding. These latter projects emphasized complexity and objectivity as the two key categories of the digitization of archives while pursuing an underlying political agenda to restore epistemic sovereignty over Russian history.

Challenges facing local government in Jordan and strategies to address them

Local governments play an important role in the economic and social development of local services provided to localities. In Jordan, local governments face problems and challenges that impede this development. The purpose of this descriptive study is to investigate the magnitude of challenges faced by local governments using a random sample (251) of mayors and heads of provincial governorates. Qualitative methods with a purposive sample employing twenty in-depth face-to-face interviews were conducted to identify the major challenges. After analyzing data using the SPSS, the study pointed out that the lack of financial resources and the lack of independence of local government in managing local funding is another major challenge. The study revealed that environmental protection was the biggest challenge. Responsiveness and public participation are other challenges faced by local governments. Based on the study results, the recommendation and provision of centralized technical assistance are required to maintain environmental protection. However, capacity building for local employees is a must. The critical financial position of local governments needs to be addressed by re- evaluating the share of funds allocated to local units.

Smart Pothole Detection and Mapping System

In any country public services and infrastructure is very crucial part of development. The qualities of these are shed light on how well the government is doing its job, the consequences of disparities in local funding. But there are few answers on these many questions. This is why this system was implemented to detect all types of potholes using different methods based on data acquired by ultrasonic sensor, gyroscope and image acquired by Pi-camera which gives the intensity and shape of the pothole in any given condition. Potholes have been a major problem in Mumbai road in recent times. Proposes system is trying to study potholes and their distribution on the roads of Mumbai with the help of hardware mentioned to acquire images and deep learning framework for potholes detection and mapping then using Android App and Google map it is generalize to the entire city.