February 17, 2011
By Staff Reporter
Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern said Tuesday that grants totaling $1.183 million would be distributed among 14 U.S.-based organizations and centers in the coming fiscal year.
The total represents a 29 percent increase over last year’s allocation.
“Government funding to the Irish immigration centers in the U.S. continues to rise very significantly,” Ahern said in a statement.
He said that the information and advisory services that the Irish immigration centers offered were of particular value to the undocumented Irish whose welfare remained an issue of deep concern to the government.
“We will continue to attach the highest priority to representing their interests in the critical period ahead,” Ahern pledged.
For the first time, aid money will be distributed to entities beyond the established Irish immigration and pastoral centers.
Ahern announced a grant of $10,000 for the memorial in Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn, to commemorate Irish-born U.S. soldiers who died in the Korean War.
Money is also heading to the Irish Emigrant and the Northern Ireland-focused Newshound websites. Each will receive