Latest news with #Nixon
USA Today
a day ago
- Sport
- USA Today
Keisean Nixon keeps defying the odds, looks to hit new heights at outside corner in 2025
Keisean Nixon's journey has been something to behold. A former undrafted free agent who spent three years with the Raiders, playing just 274 snaps of defense before being picked up by the Packers on a veteran minimum deal, he has continued to defy the odds and carve out a role. First as a kick returner, Nixon was a surprising sensation, earning All-Pro honors in 2022 and 2023. But his ascent to becoming a staple of Green Bay's defense has been even more impressive. Nixon has taken every opportunity he has been given since signing with the Packers and ran with it. As GM Brian Gutekunst put it: 'Any time we've given Keisean any different role, whether it's as a kick returner, whether it was on defense, he's answered the bell and been really productive for us." There have been multiple times when it would have been easy to assume Nixon had hit his peak, but he keeps finding another level. Now in his fourth year with the Packers, Nixon is slated to be a starting outside cornerback in 2025 after making the transition from the slot position during last season. The numbers back up the consistent progress he has made as a pro. Nixon has improved as a corner in almost every 'under the hood' statistical category year on year, earning and making the most of his increased snap count from scrimmage. Nixon's athletic profile would appear to project better on the boundary than inside, as he has plenty of speed to run with receivers but lacks the wiggle to avoid them shaking him in situations where they have more space to work with, like in the slot. Nixon improved in the slot as time went on, but was a better perimeter corner in 2024 than he was inside. He averaged a 63.8 PFF grade when playing the majority of his snaps outside as opposed to 58 in the slot. While neither of those numbers are extraordinary, and no one would mistake Nixon for an elite corner, he also showed real progress the more he was allowed to play as an outside corner, posting a 67.6 grade in the final six games in which he played primarily on the boundary. He was still never allowed to fully commit to the task of playing on the perimeter last season though, often splitting time during games or being asked to move back to the slot based on what the team needed. With some experience under his belt, and his sole attention now on the outside, Nixon feels he can hit the ground running in 2025. He told the Green Bay media: 'Second year naturally playing corner, I'm just more comfortable now and I don't really have to worry about going inside, outside, I can just focus on one position now and it's going really good for me. 'Now I know who I'm going to guard coming into the game and I can just lock in on my technique and my mindset's just a little different. I can really use my athletic ability and just get better." The signs from early training camp practices have been very encouraging, as Nixon has rarely been beaten. Even when he gave up a reception to first-round rookie Matthew Golden on Monday, the receiver had to pull off an incredible catch over Nixon, who was in tight coverage. Nixon has made a routine of being the first player out to the practice field, and is clearly a respected figure within the organization. Gutekunst was full of praise for him when speaking to the media Tuesday. He said: 'When we brought him in we knew he could play nickel and obviously the special teams stuff, and then when he got his opportunities outside he just kept making plays. He was comfortable out there, he made good decisions, and was physical in the run game. 'I'm excited to see as he continues to gain more experience outside what he does for us." Head coach Matt LaFleur said of Nixon: 'I love how he competes. I got a lot of confidence in Keisean and it all starts with the mindset to go out there and compete." On locker cleanout day at the end of the 2024 season, Nixon said he was focused on becoming 'CB1' going forward. It was easy to scoff at that notion, but given how Nixon has time and time again gone above and beyond what his ceiling was previously perceived to be, betting against him to hit new heights in 2025 may be ill-advised.
Technical.ly
a day ago
- Business
- Technical.ly
This Week in Jobs: Pound the (internet) pavement and check out these 25 tech career opportunities
There's no question the internet has massively changed the way we search for jobs. Back in the 1970s, a typical job search meant scouring classified ads in the newspaper and putting on your best business attire to hand out individually typed resumes in person. This was how it was 51 years ago today on July 29, 1974, just days before the resignation of President Nixon. Little did anyone know that this thing called the internet was quietly brewing. It was on that day that two researchers laid the groundwork for the internet with a paper introducing TCP/IP: the Transmission Control Protocol and Internet Protocol. These two systems work together to move data between computers. Without it, there would be no internet as we know it, and you would still be hitting the pavement and awkwardly asking receptionists face to face if they had any available positions. The internet started simple, by breaking it down into steps, and making sure nothing gets lost along the way. The same rules apply to job hunting. The News Use this interactive map to see where Pennsylvania's $90B in AI and energy money is going — and what doesn't add up. As the debate over artificial intelligence regulation intensifies, the divide over how and whether to rein in the technology is becoming increasingly stark. A company's price during an exit can differ from its valuation during financing, legal experts at Ballard Spahr explain. CEO Chris Wink: We were wrong before about AI killing jobs. Here's the proof. Here's how tech leaders in Delaware are using AI to bring racial equity to education, jobs and tech access. In Q2, Pittsburgh's $600M in VC, mainly driven by AI investments, defied nationwide trends of a capital slowdown. Partner Spotlight Crossbeam is the first and largest Ecosystem-Led Growth platform. The remote-first company acts as an escrow service for data, allowing companies to find overlapping customers and prospects with their partners while keeping the rest of their data private and secure. Companies use this data to sell more effectively, market to the right audiences, build the right products, collaborate with their service partners, generate demand, inform M&A, and more. This has created an entirely new way of doing business called 'Ecosystem-Led Growth' or ELG — and it works: 40% of Crossbeam's customers' closed deals come from their ecosystem. The Jobs Greater Philly Perpay is hiring an Associate Category Manager, Business Development Lead and Head of Compliance. CubeSmart is hiring a Database Engineer. NetApp has an open listing for a Senior Solutions Engineer – Enterprise Sales. Phenom in Ambler is hiring a hybrid Solution Architect. Slalom is looking for a Cyber Resilience Specialist. DC + Baltimore Educational resource company TCRE in Baltimore is bringing on two Sales Interns this fall. Brooksource is looking for a Financial Systems Security Admin and a Business Analyst. Warner Bros. Discovery is seeking a Staff Cybersecurity Engineer. Anduril has a listing for a Senior Software Engineer – Intelligence Systems. L3Harris in DC is seeking a Manager, Cyber Intelligence. Pittsburgh Duolingo has a listing for a Senior Software Engineer, Backend. Aurora is seeking a Senior Data Analyst. PNC needs a Software Engineer Sr. Palo Alto Networks is hiring a Solutions Consultant – SLED. The End Remember, every big career move starts as a seemingly tiny action.
Irish Examiner
2 days ago
- Politics
- Irish Examiner
Fergus Finlay: The ghost of presidents past could give Trump some tips
'Donald, can you hear me?' President Trump sat bolt upright in his bed. What was that ghostly voice? Surely he must be dreaming. But as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes, he became aware of a shadowy figure in a chair in the corner of the bedroom. He reached for the bedside button that would bring the Secret Service running into the room, but the sepulchral voice stopped him in his tracks. 'It's me Donald. It's Dick, your old friend. And your former president. We need to talk, because the bastards are trying to do you in, the way they destroyed me.' Nixon? Was it really Richard Nixon, sitting there in the corner of the room? Yes, they had been friends, sort of, for a couple of years after Nixon's resignation Trump had supported him in his disgrace, and they even wrote to each other quite a bit (Donald was really regretting right now his habit of writing witty letters, as he called them, to his friends). But Nixon had died more than 30 years ago. What was he doing here now? 'Listen,' Nixon said, as if anticipating Trump's questions. 'I don't know why, and from everything I do know it's not in your character, but you were kind to me for a little while when I needed friends and recognition. So I want to help you now. You're in more trouble than you know, and I need to give you some advice.' 'If you're talking about the Epstein stuff,' Trump said, 'I've got it covered. With all the dirt I've got on the Democrats, there's no way they can get me.' Nixon laughed, and it wasn't a pretty sound. 'The Democrats,' he said scornfully. 'Do you think it was the Democrats that got me? They never laid a glove on me. It was three things. I made a few mistakes along the way, and you ought to remember what they were. "But it was the media, the damn media, and most of all it was my own people who abandoned me in the end. And that's always the way it is, Donald. The opposition always do their best to punish you, but if you're looking for your real enemies they will always – always – appear on your own side. Realising he had Trump's rapt attention, the ghost went on. 'I'm surprised they haven't given the issue a name yet. But they will, they'll make it something that people can remember. And they'll probably name it after me, or that bloody building that's always associated with my name. Epsteingate, they'll call it, and when you see that name appear in the media you'll know they really have their claws into it, and into you.' 'You've already made my first mistake,' the ghost of Nixon told him. 'Being in the afterlife gives you certain insights, along with a lot of other stuff I don't want to talk about. But it doesn't enable me to see everything in those bloody files. "I do know there's something in there, maybe just one thing or maybe a few, that you are terrified of. And from everything the world already knows about your private life it must be pretty bad – it's certainly not something you and I ever talked about over drinks, or when you were trying to persuade me to buy an apartment in Trump Tower." 'It's never going to come out,' Trump told him. 'My people have promised me they'll never let that happen.' Nixon laughed his deathly laugh again. 'You're forgetting the prime lesson of Watergate – and you're not the only one who's done that. That fool in London Boris Johnson forgot it too and look what happened to him. The crime is one thing, but in politics the cover-up becomes the real crime. And you're up to your neck in a cover-up right now.' 'That's the way it has to be,' Trump said. 'No,' Nixon retorted. 'The pressure will build and build, and soon you'll have to appoint a Special Prosecutor. And you won't get away with hand-picking one of those fools from Fox News that you seem to love. It will have to be someone who at least looks independent. "And the first thing they will ask for is the files. All the files. And suddenly they won't be under your lock and key anymore. They'll come after what they always called the smoking gun in my day.' 'Have you forgotten?' Nixon demanded. 'They looked for all my tapes, and I knew if they got them, I was finished. By the way I hope you haven't been taping your private conversations …' Trump didn't reply. 'That probably tells me everything I need to know,' Nixon pressed on. 'Remember that night in 1973 – the Saturday night massacre they called it. I told the Attorney General to fire the prosecutor, and he resigned rather than follow my orders. Then his deputy walked away. "Then when I finally got rid of that stuffed shirt Archibald Cox as Special Prosecutor I was forced to accept an even tougher bastard in his place. And they got the files, and their smoking gun, in the end.' 'My people aren't quitters,' Trump said. 'They knew what they were getting into. They'd be prepared to go down fighting rather than betray the MAGA movement.' Nixon laughed out loud, and for the first time the president felt fear. 'If you believe that,' Nixon said, 'you're a bigger fool than I think you are. Do you remember how many went down fighting with me? Not one, not bloody one. The hypocrite Kissinger, even him, offering to pray with me as if I was facing execution. In the end I was entirely alone.' 'So what are you telling me to do?' Trump wanted to know. 'Let it out,' Nixon said. 'Whatever is there, make a virtue of openness. They'll comb through it for all the dirt. Tell them you're going to publish the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Then you can start denying it afresh. Your base would rather believe you – or at least forgive you. And you won't be the only one who has denials to issue. But for God's sake don't make the terrible mistake I did when I said I wasn't a crook. Don't make a speech saying, 'your president is not a paedophile' – there'd be no coming back from that. There was silence then, enough for the president to think. Of all the advice he had hoped for from Richard Nixon, telling the truth wasn't it. And he knew he couldn't. He'd built a movement, and two terms in the Oval Office, without ever once telling the truth. He knew it couldn't be that way. Nixon had to do better. But when he opened his mouth to speak, he realised the other man was silent too. And the shadowy figure in the corner was gone, had faded into nothing. Donald Trump was alone. He was perspiring heavily, and deathly afraid. What had that vision been? A voice foretelling the future, or just a bad dream? Yes, he decided. It must have been something I ate. Just a bad dream. That was all. Maybe.
CNN
5 days ago
- Health
- CNN
States, cities face loss of vaccination programs and staff after ‘baffling' cuts to federal funding
Millions of dollars have been pulled from state and local vaccination programs with no explanation, after a review of the funding agreements by the US Department of Health and Human Services. Affected programs say they will probably have to cut staffers and services because of the shortfall, and they worry that vaccination rates will also drop as they lose the ability to assist people who are low-income or uninsured. Immunization programs across the country are already struggling to address an increase in vaccine-preventable diseases. These include pertussis – also known as whooping cough – which has sickened more than 10,000 Americans and killed five children this year, as well as a smoldering outbreak of measles that has killed three people in the US and threatens to end the country's elimination status. 'That's the baffling part,' said one policy expert who spoke to CNN on the condition that they not be named for fear of government retaliation. 'Why anyone would create this disruption in the midst of the worst measles outbreak in 30 years.' Most money spent by states on vaccination comes from the federal government. The grant money, which is appropriated by Congress under Section 317 of the Public Health Services Act, enables states, territories and some large cities to collect data on vaccination, as well as provide shots to underserved children and adults. The funds also help monitor the safety of vaccines and fight misinformation. The money is doled out in five-year grants overseen by US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the most recent awards were due to states on July 1. This year, however, HHS conducted lengthy reviews of the awards, which delayed their arrival in some cases. HHS Director of Communications Andrew Nixon said the reviews were part of agency cost-cutting efforts. 'The Defend the Spend initiative is a department-wide effort to ensure that taxpayer dollars are being used effectively, transparently, and in alignment with this administration,' Nixon said in a statement to CNN. 'As part of this oversight, grant recipients may be asked to provide additional information, which is essential to preventing waste, fraud, and abuse. HHS is committed to working all grantees to resolve outstanding issues as quickly as possible while maintaining the highest standards of accountability.' Public health advocates say the latest funding cuts appear to be part of a larger pattern of efforts by HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to disrupt and dismantle the America's vaccination infrastructure. 'Millions of children missed their routine vaccinations during the pandemic,' and never caught back up said Dr. Caitlin Rivers, director of the Center for Response Outbreak Innovation at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Vaccine hesitancy has also increased, driven by a deluge of misinformation, some of it now coming from official channels. As a result, vaccination rates have dropped, and some communities are no longer protected by herd immunity, the threshold of vaccination required to prevent certain infectious diseases from easily spreading. If state vaccination programs are not adequately resourced, 'we're just going to continue to fall further and further behind, and that sets the stage for things like measles and pertussis outbreaks, which we're seeing,' Rivers said. Public health programs often become victims of their own success, she said. 'When there is a large public health emergency … there are huge investments made in public health, because we can see very clearly what the consequences are of having inadequate resourcing and inadequate infrastructure. But over time, those investments begin to work, and the threats recede, and we start to forget why it's so important to maintain those defenses,' Rivers said. 'And I think now, five years out of Covid, we're very clearly in the neglect cycle, and we're seeing a lot of the investments we made during the pandemic be pulled back,' she added. Of 66 jurisdictions awarded federal immunization funding this year, about 40 received awards lower than their funding targets. And more than a dozen states and cities received lower awards this year than they did in 2019, just before the Covid-19 pandemic began, the last time these awards were offered through the CDC, according to a CNN analysis of federal data. Massachusetts, New York, Indiana, California and Arizona were among those awarded less this year than in 2019, the year before the Covid-19 pandemic began. 'That's really, really unbelievable to us,' said one public health advocate who asked not to be named for fear of political retaliation for speaking out against the cuts. 'How could we come out of a pandemic with half of states being less prepared?' Other states found that their awards were far lower than they'd been told to expect. In January 2025, the CDC sent out a Notice of Funding Opportunity – essentially an invitation – to states, territories and certain large cities. It came with a funding target: the amount they could expect if their grant proposals were accepted. Washington, for example, was told it could expect about $9.5 million, so the Department of Health planned for that amount for the 2026 fiscal year. When the state got its Notice of Award on July 1, however, it was for $7.8 million, an 18% reduction. Massachusetts was told it could expect $7.7 million for the upcoming fiscal year, already a 20% reduction from its 2025 budget. When the award arrived, it was $1 million under the targeted amount, at $6.7 million, which means the department expects to operate with about 30% less funding next year than it has this year. Colorado received almost $500,000 less than it expected, a decrease of about 5% from the amount it budgeted for, according to federal data California, Illinois, Michigan and New York also received lower-than-expected funding awards, according to a CNN analysis of federal data. Sometimes, the delays and errors in funding caused chaos: At least one state, Idaho, furloughed its immunization program staff with no notice after the money didn't arrive when expected. When the award did come through a day later, they were put back to work, but medical providers who reached out in the interim to submit their regular data updates had no one to help them and didn't know when services would be restored. The cuts didn't just affect state health departments. The city of New Haven, Connecticut, had to lay off immunization positions that were supported by subawards it receives from the state grant. When the grant didn't arrive in time, the state directed the city not to incur any more expenses, and when the federal money did come through, it was 20% less than anticipated. Chicago is also preparing to lay off immunization workers, according to multiple sources with knowledge of the city's plans, who asked not to be named because they feared retaliation by the Trump administration. Not all awardees saw reductions, however. About two dozen jurisdictions, including Alabama, Idaho and Wyoming and Montana, got significant funding increases over their award targets for this year. State officials who spoke to CNN for this story say they were given no explanation for why the awards were reduced or increased this cycle. The cuts come on top of the loss of billions in unspent Covid relief funding that was being used by states, in part, to help staff immunization programs. In late March, HHS directed the CDC to roll back about $11.4 billion in Covid-era funding granted to state and local health departments. Another $1 billion was reclaimed from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. A survey conducted by the Association of Immunization Managers found that the Covid money clawback alone has led to the elimination 579 staff positions in state vaccination programs. After the new grant cuts, some jurisdictions said they would probably need to lay off even more workers but were trying to assess the changes that would be needed. Some programs said they hoped state funding could help fill the gaps. In the past, the funding amounts that jurisdictions were told they could expect have been determined by a relatively simple formula that primarily relied on an area's population. This year, however, federal officials deployed a more complicated formula that took into account population levels as well as how much of a state was rural and how many providers participate in the Vaccines for Children program compared with the overall population, according to a public health advocate familiar with the awards who asked not to be named for fear of political retaliation. Immunization programs were told they could expect about $418 million in funding. All told, what they were awarded totaled roughly $398 million. Changes to the funding formula don't appear to account for the reductions, however. The formula was applied to the target amounts that were distributed in January. Instead, changes to the awards came after the HHS review, which in some cases delayed the release of the money and left programs hanging. Hawaii, for example, received authorization to borrow up to $100,000 from the state government to pay salaries and cover operational expenses until its award came through, about two weeks late. Public health advocates blasted the funding decision. 'Stripping 317 waiver funds combined with other losses is starving state and local public health budgets and is not just short-sighted, it's reckless,' said Dr. Brian Castrucci, president and chief executive officer of the nonprofit deBeaumont Foundation, which advocates for the public health workforce. 'We're watching the deliberate dismantling of the public health safety net in real time,' Castrucci said.
CNN
5 days ago
- Health
- CNN
States, cities face loss of vaccination programs and staff after ‘baffling' cuts to federal funding
Vaccines Federal agencies Children's healthFacebookTweetLink Follow Millions of dollars have been pulled from state and local vaccination programs with no explanation, after a review of the funding agreements by the US Department of Health and Human Services. Affected programs say they will probably have to cut staffers and services because of the shortfall, and they worry that vaccination rates will also drop as they lose the ability to assist people who are low-income or uninsured. Immunization programs across the country are already struggling to address an increase in vaccine-preventable diseases. These include pertussis – also known as whooping cough – which has sickened more than 10,000 Americans and killed five children this year, as well as a smoldering outbreak of measles that has killed three people in the US and threatens to end the country's elimination status. 'That's the baffling part,' said one policy expert who spoke to CNN on the condition that they not be named for fear of government retaliation. 'Why anyone would create this disruption in the midst of the worst measles outbreak in 30 years.' Most money spent by states on vaccination comes from the federal government. The grant money, which is appropriated by Congress under Section 317 of the Public Health Services Act, enables states, territories and some large cities to collect data on vaccination, as well as provide shots to underserved children and adults. The funds also help monitor the safety of vaccines and fight misinformation. The money is doled out in five-year grants overseen by US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the most recent awards were due to states on July 1. This year, however, HHS conducted lengthy reviews of the awards, which delayed their arrival in some cases. HHS Director of Communications Andrew Nixon said the reviews were part of agency cost-cutting efforts. 'The Defend the Spend initiative is a department-wide effort to ensure that taxpayer dollars are being used effectively, transparently, and in alignment with this administration,' Nixon said in a statement to CNN. 'As part of this oversight, grant recipients may be asked to provide additional information, which is essential to preventing waste, fraud, and abuse. HHS is committed to working all grantees to resolve outstanding issues as quickly as possible while maintaining the highest standards of accountability.' Public health advocates say the latest funding cuts appear to be part of a larger pattern of efforts by HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to disrupt and dismantle the America's vaccination infrastructure. 'Millions of children missed their routine vaccinations during the pandemic,' and never caught back up said Dr. Caitlin Rivers, director of the Center for Response Outbreak Innovation at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Vaccine hesitancy has also increased, driven by a deluge of misinformation, some of it now coming from official channels. As a result, vaccination rates have dropped, and some communities are no longer protected by herd immunity, the threshold of vaccination required to prevent certain infectious diseases from easily spreading. If state vaccination programs are not adequately resourced, 'we're just going to continue to fall further and further behind, and that sets the stage for things like measles and pertussis outbreaks, which we're seeing,' Rivers said. Public health programs often become victims of their own success, she said. 'When there is a large public health emergency … there are huge investments made in public health, because we can see very clearly what the consequences are of having inadequate resourcing and inadequate infrastructure. But over time, those investments begin to work, and the threats recede, and we start to forget why it's so important to maintain those defenses,' Rivers said. 'And I think now, five years out of Covid, we're very clearly in the neglect cycle, and we're seeing a lot of the investments we made during the pandemic be pulled back,' she added. Of 66 jurisdictions awarded federal immunization funding this year, about 40 received awards lower than their funding targets. And more than a dozen states and cities received lower awards this year than they did in 2019, just before the Covid-19 pandemic began, the last time these awards were offered through the CDC, according to a CNN analysis of federal data. Massachusetts, New York, Indiana, California and Arizona were among those awarded less this year than in 2019, the year before the Covid-19 pandemic began. 'That's really, really unbelievable to us,' said one public health advocate who asked not to be named for fear of political retaliation for speaking out against the cuts. 'How could we come out of a pandemic with half of states being less prepared?' Other states found that their awards were far lower than they'd been told to expect. In January 2025, the CDC sent out a Notice of Funding Opportunity – essentially an invitation – to states, territories and certain large cities. It came with a funding target: the amount they could expect if their grant proposals were accepted. Washington, for example, was told it could expect about $9.5 million, so the Department of Health planned for that amount for the 2026 fiscal year. When the state got its Notice of Award on July 1, however, it was for $7.8 million, an 18% reduction. Massachusetts was told it could expect $7.7 million for the upcoming fiscal year, already a 20% reduction from its 2025 budget. When the award arrived, it was $1 million under the targeted amount, at $6.7 million, which means the department expects to operate with about 30% less funding next year than it has this year. Colorado received almost $500,000 less than it expected, a decrease of about 5% from the amount it budgeted for, according to federal data California, Illinois, Michigan and New York also received lower-than-expected funding awards, according to a CNN analysis of federal data. Sometimes, the delays and errors in funding caused chaos: At least one state, Idaho, furloughed its immunization program staff with no notice after the money didn't arrive when expected. When the award did come through a day later, they were put back to work, but medical providers who reached out in the interim to submit their regular data updates had no one to help them and didn't know when services would be restored. The cuts didn't just affect state health departments. The city of New Haven, Connecticut, had to lay off immunization positions that were supported by subawards it receives from the state grant. When the grant didn't arrive in time, the state directed the city not to incur any more expenses, and when the federal money did come through, it was 20% less than anticipated. Chicago is also preparing to lay off immunization workers, according to multiple sources with knowledge of the city's plans, who asked not to be named because they feared retaliation by the Trump administration. Not all awardees saw reductions, however. About two dozen jurisdictions, including Alabama, Idaho and Wyoming and Montana, got significant funding increases over their award targets for this year. State officials who spoke to CNN for this story say they were given no explanation for why the awards were reduced or increased this cycle. The cuts come on top of the loss of billions in unspent Covid relief funding that was being used by states, in part, to help staff immunization programs. In late March, HHS directed the CDC to roll back about $11.4 billion in Covid-era funding granted to state and local health departments. Another $1 billion was reclaimed from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. A survey conducted by the Association of Immunization Managers found that the Covid money clawback alone has led to the elimination 579 staff positions in state vaccination programs. After the new grant cuts, some jurisdictions said they would probably need to lay off even more workers but were trying to assess the changes that would be needed. Some programs said they hoped state funding could help fill the gaps. In the past, the funding amounts that jurisdictions were told they could expect have been determined by a relatively simple formula that primarily relied on an area's population. This year, however, federal officials deployed a more complicated formula that took into account population levels as well as how much of a state was rural and how many providers participate in the Vaccines for Children program compared with the overall population, according to a public health advocate familiar with the awards who asked not to be named for fear of political retaliation. Immunization programs were told they could expect about $418 million in funding. All told, what they were awarded totaled roughly $398 million. Changes to the funding formula don't appear to account for the reductions, however. The formula was applied to the target amounts that were distributed in January. Instead, changes to the awards came after the HHS review, which in some cases delayed the release of the money and left programs hanging. Hawaii, for example, received authorization to borrow up to $100,000 from the state government to pay salaries and cover operational expenses until its award came through, about two weeks late. Public health advocates blasted the funding decision. 'Stripping 317 waiver funds combined with other losses is starving state and local public health budgets and is not just short-sighted, it's reckless,' said Dr. Brian Castrucci, president and chief executive officer of the nonprofit deBeaumont Foundation, which advocates for the public health workforce. 'We're watching the deliberate dismantling of the public health safety net in real time,' Castrucci said.
