Truancy Pilot, Nats Park Renovation Funds Highlight Post-Budget Session • Council of the District of Columbia

With a productive but extended budget season now finally in the books, the Council’s latest Legislative Meeting marked a return to a non-budget legislative policy focus.

Truancy

One key piece of legislation that was passed on an emergency basis resulted from a unique way of settling an administrative disagreement between the executive and the Council. In the mayor’s proposed budget, interventions regarding student truancy were to be shifted from the Child and Family Services Agency to the Department of Human Services (DHS). For its part, the Council sought an expanded focus on combating truancy, but while leaving that responsibility with the same agency that currently holds it (CFSA).

Usually, in cases of disputes like this, one branch or the other ultimately gets their way. But in regards to the emergency truancy legislation, the Council took a “prove it” stance, allowing a smaller-scale, limited timeframe experiment for the mayor’s desired agency to tackle the challenge, and prove its success before potentially being broadened in the future.

DHS runs a smaller but well-received existing truancy program, but the Council had questions regarding how successfully the agency could expand services by an extensive order of magnitude, and how effective these expanded services would be. Additionally, the agency has faced other unrelated programmatic challenges recently, including a federal penalty for poor administration and a high error rate in Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits.

The pilot truancy program as laid out in the emergency legislation will involve five high schools selected by DHS, all with truancy rates that exceeded 50 percent in the prior school year. DHS must notify the participating schools of the the details of the program at least ten business days before the start of the school year, must provide a preliminary report on results by March 31, 2025, and a final report five months later. The report must list the five most frequent excuses provided for truancy, describe the five most frequent interventions taken by DHS in response, and detail the improved attendance and academic performance outcomes tied to each.

The additional $3.38 million in funding the Council provided for expanded truancy services at DHS would be available for expenditure as the school year begins, rather than waiting for the October 1 start date for the new fiscal year, due to the accelerated timeline allowed by passage of the emergency measure.

Fighting truancy has been a long-term focus of the Council, and a series of further new anti-truancy bills are currently under consideration. The Council recognizes that while it is false to believe that all truant youth engage in criminal behavior, virtually all youth who engage in criminal behavior have truancy problems. Addressing truancy can therefore have public safety benefits beyond the obvious education impacts.

Nationals Park Renovation Funds

Nationals Parks is unique among District sports facilities in that it is owned by the District government. In light of the drama earlier this year surrounding the thankfully since-abandoned plan by the Wizards and the Capitals to decamp from DC in pursuit of state-of-art facilities, the Council sought to prevent a similar potential future action by the Nationals.

With the bonds that funded the facility soon to be paid off, some of the funding mechanisms that funded the purchase of the ballpark itself will be retired, but others will be dedicated to a standalone maintenance fund. The legislation creating the new fund will ensure ready access to needed maintenance funds at a time in the stadium’s lifecycle when substantial renovations are to be expected, and when a lease renewal for the Nationals at the ballpark is in the works.

Other Measures

In other action, the Council passed measures at the most recent Legislative Meeting that would:

extend the same right-of-action protections currently provided in broader consumer protection laws specifically to student loan borrowers, and prohibit unfair, deceptive, or abusive practices by student loan providers (just as they are already banned for debt collectors, auto lenders, etc.)
ban female genital mutilation in the District, prohibit District minor residents from being taken abroad for the procedure, and ensure that gender-affirming care is not misconstrued as falling under this legislation

The Council’s next scheduled Legislative Meeting will be held on September 17. During the Council’s summer recess, while hearing and Legislative Meetings will not be held, the Council’s other work (constituent service, neighborhood outreach, research and policy development, etc.) will proceed as always.