More than $500 million in federal grants went to Community Health Centers throughout the U-S. Missouri centers got … nothing. Senator Bond says that’s an outrage.

Twelve of the 21 Community Health Centers in Missouri applied for grants through the federal stimulus funding. Not one was approved.

Bond says a third of the half a million dollars went to only two states, the rest ended up on the coasts.

According to the Boston Globe, “Roughly one of every eight dollars that hte federal Health Resources and Services Administration committed … to community clinics in bound for Massachusetts.”

Massachusetts received about $80 milion — almost 16 percent of the total grant; Claifornia recieved roughly $65 million — almost 13 percent.

“Twenty-nine percent fo the funding went to only two states and many states, all on the front lines fo trying to provide healthcare to our most vulnerable popluations, did not receive any funding,” Bond says.

Bond says this is what happens when federal spending decisions are placed in the hands of unelected bureaucrats.

“Too often, federal dollars are sent to the East and West Coasts, overlooking states like Missouri in the heartland,” Bond says, adding that he believes trusting local leaders and empowering them to fund critical projects that serve a compelling state or local need with a small portion of federal discretionary spending is an important tool to help states like Missouri.

He says he’s written a letter to Health and Human Services asking about the application criteria, and asking why Missouri was left out. Missouri’s Community Health Centers leaders say this will limit access to health care services to those most in need.

Those leaders are also expressing their dismay to Bond and HHS:

“Throughout Region VII of the DHSS, only one CHC, an organization from Iowa, received a FIP award,” writes Grace Hill in St. Louis. “It appears to us the award decisions were at least regionally disproportionate.”

From the Crider Health Center in Wentzville, the Obama Administration’s decision will “severely lmit access to health care services to those most in need.” The applicants were also not allowed to make a case for themselves, The Crider Center says. “Each applicant was limited to 20 pages to justify a grant worth as much as $12 million.”

Other applicants, Myrtle Hillard David Comprehensive Health Centers in St. Louis, Samuel U. Rodgers in Kansas City, Swope Health Services in Kansas City … all are expressing their disappointment in being passed over.