Millions of dollars in grant money cut. Total operating budget gutted by a third. Hefty staff layoffs.

For Treehouse, a nonprofit serving foster kids, impressive outcomes and growing programming were not enough to save it from these challenges. It is one of dozens of educational organizations partnering with the state that has landed on the funding chopping block as the state Legislature grappled with a multibillion-dollar budget deficit over the next four years.

Treehouse CEO Dawn Rains said the massive cuts took the organization by surprise.

“We had to make some pretty quick decisions about how we were going to manage moving forward,” she said.

Two of Treehouse’s state-funded grants saw significant reductions.

One, from the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction, provides $7

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