Local AIDS activists are blasting state health officials for failing to apply for up to $6.7 million in federal Minority AIDS Initiative funds.

“It’s horrible, the state’s lack of sensitivity and caring for people with AIDS,” said Jose DeMarco, an organizer for ACT UP Philadelphia. “We’re facing devastating AIDS cuts. And state officials don’t lift a finger to apply for available funds?”

Claudine Battisti, a spokesperson for the state Department of Health, said time constraints made it prohibitive for the department to apply for the funds.

She said state officials had about six weeks to apply for the grant, which wasn’t enough time for them.

David Bowman, a spokesperson for Health Resources and Services Administration, the federal agency that distributes the MAI funds, said he wasn’t aware of other states complaining about insufficient time to apply for the money.

He said this year’s state MAI funds are to be used for outreach and education in the minority AIDS communities and to help people access drug-assistance programs.

Examples of funded programs include the creation of targeted fliers, advertising in community-specific newspapers, public-service announcements and translation services, he said.

Bowman said grant awards are expected to be announced shortly.

In the past, states and cities received MAI funds on a formula basis, depending on the number of minority AIDS cases. This year, for the first time, recipients had to compete for the funds through a merit-based competition.

State health officials said they asked Philadelphia health officials for help in applying for this year’s MAI dollars, Battisti said, but local health officials declined to work with them, even though Philadelphia could have received some of the money.

“We reached out to the Philadelphia Health Department to see if they would be willing to collaborate on the application in order to expedite the release of the funds to the selected recipient,” Battisti said. “They declined to collaborate.”

Jeff Moran, a spokesperson for the city Health Department, said a collaboration with the state wasn’t possible. But Moran said city health officials did encourage the state to apply for the MAI funds on “several occasions.”

If local health officials failed to cooperate the state, they should be held accountable, DeMarco said.

“There should be better collaboration when people’s lives and health are at stake,” he said. “These bureaucrats are either lazy, incompetent or don’t give a damn.”

Battisti also noted that, while states could apply for up to $6.7 million in MAI funds, in all likelihood Pennsylvania would have received a much smaller grant — all 50 states vie for the money in the fund, which is then divided among them.

Last year, Pennsylvania received $217,000 in MAI funds, she noted.

DeMarco remained unswayed by the state’s position.

“Every penny counts when you’re talking about a system that has minimal or no translation services for Latinos and other groups — not to mention all sorts of other inadequacies,” he said.

Battisti noted that state officials secured about $6 million in other HIV funding for Philadelphia this year, and she refuted allegations of insensitivity towards minority PWAs.

Last year, Philadelphia received $1,585,589 in MAI funds, and this year, city health officials applied for about $4 million in MAI funds.

DeMarco noted that Philadelphia was eligible to apply for up to $10,750,000 in MAI funds, and questioned why city officials didn’t apply for all of the available money.

But Moran said applying for too much MAI money might have hurt the city’s chances.

“We did not want to damage the competitiveness of our proposal by submitting an application that would be viewed as totally unrealistic,” he said.

Timothy Cwiek can be reached at (215) 625-8501 ext. 208.