In my regular life, one of the things I do is edit Charity Channel’s online Grants & Foundation Review. I wrote this article yesterday for the review and thought it would be of interest and maybe useful to readers of the Creative Class blog.
This is Stimulating
by Michael Wells
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), otherwise known as the Stimulus Package, is setting the grants world on its ear. As a consultant, I’m getting calls from legitimate clients with a good idea of what they want, small nonprofits wanting me to find them grant opportunities, and an up-tick in individuals and small businesses looking for “free government money you don’t have to pay back.”
I’ve been doing some research and while I’m not an expert I can give some hints:
- The full $797 billion in new spending will be spread over 10 years, although the intention of many programs is to get it out the door this federal fiscal year (September 30).
- Much of the funding will go directly to states and local governments, which may or may not re-grant it.
- Stimulus grant funding will go mostly through existing competitive grant programs within agencies and be subject to the regular regulations.
- Most agencies don’t have new RFPs or NOFAs out yet.
- There are lots of programs in the Departments of Agriculture, Education and Justice. There are very few in Health & Human Services.
The agencies are racing to get their arms around the Act, but it’s not in place yet. My best advice is to look at some of the opportunities at the end of this article, check out these sites and keep checking back.
- Grants.gov has a page with links to agency recovery sites and another to grant opportunities.
- The Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance website says it’s being updated to better support the ARRA, with the changes supposed to be operational by March 31.
- There’s a government website, recovery.gov, that’s supposed to make the process transparent, but so far it seems to be just happy talk.
- At the individual agencies, information is still shaky. HUD has one incomplete announcement page for its $995,000,000 but no details and no full announcements. Hopefully some of its funding will rescue affordable housing projects left stranded by the collapse of the tax credit market.
Given that the Obama Administration has been in office barely two months and the ARRA was signed February 16, it’s too early to expect much detail or for programs to be operating for another month or two. However, there are some good sources of information to begin preparing for the floodgates to open.
The American Association of Grant Professionals has assembled a Stimulus Plan Grant Information feature open to non-members that has overviews and analysis from a number of sources. Go here and scroll down the left side to the 10th button. You have to open each document separately, but they’re worthwhile.
One of Portland’s Congressmen is holding a public meeting this Friday on the stimulus package and I wouldn’t be surprised if many Representatives are doing the same in their hometowns. Check your congressional website or call their local offices.
