Appellant appeals the denial based upon the failure of the NAECP to grant the Center accreditation. Appellant has appealed the NAECP decision and seeks a continuation of funding from the Council until its appeal with the National Academy is resolved.In order to promote a high standard of programming among its grantees, the Council has decided to condition the continued receipt of child development grants upon the grantees' attainment of accreditation by the National Academy of Early Childhood Programs ["NAECP"]. 281--IAC--64.15(5).

Mr. Knapp's position on appeal is that the funding for PHH should not be terminated because there is so much need for this program in Waterloo. He testified that Waterloo has one of the highest concentrations of at-risk families in the State. Project High Hopes is a collaborative effort between Grin and Grow, Tri-County Headstart, Regional Transit Commission, and the Waterloo Community Schools. Project High Hopes is unique and it is one of the few at-risk grant programs for three- and four-year-old children not located in a public school or headstart setting.

Donna Eggleston testified on behalf of the Child Development Coordinating Council that all of the grant programs have known since the Spring of 1993 that NAECP accreditation would be required for continued funding. In fact, the programs were notified in the Spring of 1993 that by April 1994 accreditation would be required for continued funding. Because of the need to establish administrative rules for the process, the Council couldn't establish a deadline prior to April 15, 1995. Out of the 73 original programs that started the accredita-tion process, 69 programs are now accredited. Three programs have been terminated for failure to receive accreditation by the re-quired deadline. Two of these programs had received a waiver to extend their time until November 3, 1995, to obtain accreditation. One of the programs failed to receive a waiver and was terminated on May 30, 1995. Grin and Grow is the only program that seeks continued funding in spite of its failure to receive accreditation by the November 3, 1995, deadline.

The fact that the Center was not accredited by NAECP suggests that the Program does not meet the standards that have been established by the Council for the award of its scarce funding resources. For the Council to extend its funding of the Center, pending the ability of PHH to attain accreditation, is to abdicate its standards. No legal authority exists for the Council to award funds to a continuation program which has not met the standards set by regulation and rule.

There is no dispute that the need for this program in the Waterloo area is great; nor that Project High Hopes has had a history of meeting all prior program requirements of the at-risk grant program in the past. Neither, however, is there is a dispute about its failure to meet the accreditation requirement which it has known about since 1993. Unfortunately, the Council has no alternative but to terminate funds to this program until such time as it meets the standards set by the Council.

That the decision of the Child Development Coordinating Council terminating funding for Project High Hopes for its failure to attain accreditation by November 3, 1995, was affirmed.