Grants 101 Part II: Tracking the Wild Grant

Securing government grants is at the top of many organizations' government relations goals. John McHugh from North Carolina's Office of Economic Recovery and Investment contributed posts to help non-profits understand the basics of government grants.

So you’ve already talked to your group about grants, gone to the Secretary of State’s office and created a corporation to apply, registered with CCR, gotten a DUNS number, and now you’re ready to apply for a grant from a federal, state, or local governmental source. Step 1 is deciding what it is you want to do.

This sounds a good deal simpler than it actually is. “Help the homeless” is a noble wish, but “open a 50-bed shelter with attached soup kitchen” is a goal that might get funded. The trick here is to walk the line between wish and goal.

The most frequent thing I tell to groups looking for ARRA-funded grants is that they will never be a ‘perfect’ grant. So the goal is not to wait for the exactly right grant to come along, but to adjust the program to fit the grant that exists. I call it ‘finding a way to fit into the funding stream.’ That homeless shelter might need to have counseling or an educational component, or partner with a group that does, in order to qualify. Keep an open mind when looking for opportunities.

A word of advice: it is always helpful to partner with other organizations when applying for grants. A partner can increase both the grants you can apply for, and the ability to successfully win those grants. Governmental entities, school, universities, religious institutions, and other local groups are good places to look for partners. So while looking, don’t just think ‘what can I apply for’ but also ‘who can I partner with.’

So where do I find those opportunities? There are numerous online resources available:

Grants.gov is the federal government’s one-stop shop for all grants. This is good, because that means grants.gov has lots of opportunities, but it’s bad because it means there are A LOT of information to sift through. Grants.gov has improved a lot over the last few years, with FAQs and assistance and a search function that actually works, but it can still be a bear to go through.

Recovery.gov is the website of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. While the ARRA’s grant making days are over, it may be helpful to take a look at the website, since the openness of Recovery.gov is going to be how public programs are going to be handled from now on.

NCGrants.gov is the State of North Carolina equivalent to Grants.gov. It’s still under construction, so some opportunities will still be available only on various NC state agency websites.

NCOpenBook.gov is the State of North Carolina’s government transparency website. NCOpenBook.gov has a grants page with links to NC grant making agencies, and a searchable data base of North Carolina Funding Opportunities.

Google.com is…well, you know. Google can help finding out about existing grants and more importantly current grant winners. Reaching out to a current or past grant recipient can be very helpful to understand what the grant makers are looking for in a successful applicant.

And that’s it for grant searching tools. Up next: Grant writing and you!

Grants 101: Part I, Grants in the Wild

Securing government grants is at the top of many organizations' government relations goals. John McHugh from North Carolina's Office of Economic Recovery and Investment contributed posts to help non-profits understand the basics of government grants.

President Obama’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which passed in early 2009, increased many federal, state and local governmental grant making opportunities, and my office was on the forefront of drafting funding opportunities, writing applications, reviewing applications, and overseeing compliance.

So what are grants? Most simply, a grant is a gift, or as the man in the ugly jacket yells, ‘Free Money!” But, as you might imagine, it’s quite a bit more complicated than that.

Generally, grants are opportunities where organizations receive support from a governmental source for a specific purpose (there are grants available for individuals, usually for education or research, and non-governmental grant making entities, such as the Gates Foundation, but that’s beyond the scope of these posts).

The purpose usually depends on the grant-making agency: the Department of Energy is going to fund research grants, while the EPA might fund a wetlands clean-up. A good rule of thumb is that an agency is going to want to fund a grant that furthers that agency’s mission. Grants are a good way for an agency to explore a new way of doing business, or allow an entity who has close ties to a community to solve a given problem (for example, the Federal Department of Justice doesn’t want to open a woman’s shelter in Durham, but they’ll be happy to help fund one).

With that in mind, here are a few things that are generally universal to all governmental grants.

Grants don’t give money up-front, because almost all grants work on a reimbursement basis. You’ll have to submit various documents during the reimbursement process, a process that can take anywhere from a few days to a few weeks.

Grants go to organizations, not to people. In almost all non-educational settings your group will have to be a corporation of some kind in order to apply. You’ll have to set up your corporation with the North Carolina Secretary of State, and you’ll have to have a valid tax ID and DUNS and/or CCR (that’s Central Contractor Registration, not Credence Clearwater Revival, although that would be much cooler) number to apply.

Grants come with rules. All grants will have some sort of laws, rules, regulations, and policies attached to them. The more hands the money passes through, the more of those there will be. So a state agency making a grant with money from the federal government will have more rules than a grant from a federal agency. The statutes/rules/regulations/directives will be referenced in the application and the grant agreement, if you’re lucky enough to receive a grant. Read them. Know them. Love them.

Grants come with strings. Remember, someone is giving you money to do something, that someone wants something in return. Usually, that’s the good work that someone granted you the money for, but there are always other requirements. Reporting is a big one, compliance with the rules issued for the grant is another one, and transparency is important. You’ll also be prohibited from doing some things, most notably political advocacy as a grant recipient with grant funding. Always remember, grants are public funds, your behavior will be public.

So that’s it for our grant overview, in the next episode, your grant, and where to find it!