Trump administration shuts Head Start office that serves all of Illinois, several other states

Five of 10 regional Head Start offices, including the Chicago office that oversaw all of Illinois and several other states, have been shut down as part of layoffs at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, according to the National Head Start Association.

On Thursday, local organizations that have contracts with the federal government to provide Head Start programs to children from low-income families got their first notifications on what that may mean to them going forward.

As part of what was billed as a “restructuring,” the federal agency is consolidating 10 regional offices into five, “closing offices in Boston, New York, Chicago, Seattle, and San Francisco, effective April 1, 2025,” according to an email sent out just after 1 p.m. Thursday from Laurie Todd-Smith, deputy assistant secretary for the Office of Early Childhood Development, which is part of Health and Human Services.

The remaining regional offices are centered in Dallas, Kansas City, Denver, Atlanta, and Philadelphia.

The email notification of the closures said that the restructuring would save taxpayers $1.8 billion a year. The agency’s total appropriation was $12.27 billion a year in 2024, according to headstart.gov. The email also told providers to continue to use existing infrastructure for communicating specific grant activities and that Office of Head Start staff are monitoring those communications.

“OHS staff remain fully committed to supporting Head Start grant recipients and the important work you do to serve children and families across the nation” and that the restructuring will not impact critical services.

The offices that were closed, although serving multi-state areas, seem to be only in states with Democrat governors, Lauri Morrison-Frichtl, executive director of the Springfield-based Illinois Head Start Association, said.

In addition to Illinois, the Chicago Head Start office served Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin.

“The hard part is there was no plan” communicated to the contracted agencies prior to the sudden office closures, Morrison-Frichtl said. “There is no operational strategy to support the programs.”

Scores of government employees who help administer Head Start, which is federally funded but run by schools and nonprofits, have been put on leave, according to the Associated Press.

Illinois Head Start providers have been on edge since January, when temporary freeze on federal grants shut down their online payment portal, either just for the day but in some cases several days.

According to the email sent to providers Thursday, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy announced the regional closures “in accordance with President Trump’s Executive Order ‘Implementing the President’s ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ Workforce Optimization Initiative.‘”

Local agencies do not yet know where Illinois’ Head Start programs will now report to, Morrison-Frichtl said early Thursday. The email did not clarify that information.

“They want to combine regional offices, but there are already too many grants for just one office to manage,” Morrison-Frichtl said. “We have 66 grants in Illinois who do not know who to call.”

Kelly Neidel, director of Two Rivers Head Start, serving Kane and DeKalb counties, said she did get a response when she emailed a question following Tuesday’s regional closures.

The stress of the unknown is getting to her, Neidel said. “I am just beside myself, to be honest.”