NINOS Head Start employees celebrate one more year of funding

SOUTH PADRE ISLAND, Texas (ValleyCentral) — After months of uncertainty, over 500 Neighbors in Need of Services Inc. (NINOS) Head Start employees gathered at the South Padre Island Convention Center to celebrate one more year of funding to continue providing services to children and families in the Valley.

Since 1990, NINOS Head Start has offered educational programs, nutritional guidance, dental health services, and other special services to children up to 4 years old. They strive to serve both children and families in Cameron and Willacy counties based on their income and area.

Earlier this year, the Trump administration asked Congress to eliminate funding for Head Start as part of sweeping budget cuts.

 Mary Sosa-Villareal, President of the Board of Directors for NINOS Head Start, says this time was full of fear and worry for the organization.

"We at one point didn't know where payroll was going to come from because funds were shut off at one point, and it was the end of the bi-week payroll," Sosa-Villareal said.

After months of advocacy, Congressman Vicente Gonzalez announced $20.5 million in federal funding to NINOS from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The award comes from the agency's discretionary funding for the 2025 fiscal year, which Gonzalez voted to pass.

Yesterday, NINOS staff participated in a training to prepare for the upcoming school year. They received remarks from several guest speakers, including Gonzalez. He said he believes if this program were to have been eliminated, it would have been a disgrace to the RGV and surrounding communities. 

"There's nothing beautiful about cutting health care from senior citizens, the working poor, feeding children in school, and certainly this Head Start program. We saved this program; we lost a lot of other things, but this program, we saved it, and we're going to continue to work to ensure that we keep it."

NINOS Executive Director David Kowalski tells ValleyCentral while they are relieved to have secured one more year of funding, the future of this program still looks unclear. He says they have yet to receive any guidance from the national Head Start office on how to manage accepting children of immigrant parents.