A listing of County, State and Federal grant opportunities for nonprofits.
(Updated 2/24/2021)
Funding Opportunities (as of 2/24/2021)
USDA’s Support for Beginning Farmers and Ranchers
The USDA is offers a variety of loans and grants to help producers start or grow their operations.
- The Farm Service Agency (FSA) is the lender of first opportunity for many new and beginning farmers. Their farm loan programs serve as a temporary source of credit with the intent of graduating borrowers to commercial credit.
- Farm Ownership Loans can provide access to land and capital.
- Farm Operating Loans can help pay farm operating expenses, open doors to new markets and marketing opportunities, and assist with diversifying operations.
- Microloans can also provide an important source of financial assistance during start-up.
Each year, FSA targets a portion of its loan funds for beginning farmers and ranchers with 75% for Direct Farm Ownership, 50% for Direct Operating Loans, and 40% for Guaranteed Farm Ownership and Operating Loans, which are reserved until April 1 of each fiscal year.
To apply, contact your local USDA Service Center.
Grants Enhance Rural Communities in Targeted States
Deadline: October 1, 2020
The Laura Jane Musser Fund encourages collaborative and participatory efforts among citizens in communities in Colorado, Hawaiʻi, Minnesota, and Wyoming, as well as Delaware, Greene, Otsego, Schoharie, Sullivan, and Ulster counties in New York and the Rio Grande Valley, Deep East Texas, and the Brazos Valley regions of Texas.
Through the Rural Initiative Program, the Fund supports efforts that will help to strengthen individual rural towns in the targeted states in a number of civic areas, including, but not limited to, economic development, business preservation, arts and humanities, public space improvements, and education. Planning grants of up to $5,000 and implementation grants of up to $25,000 are provided.
Criteria:
- The applicant community must have a population of 10,000 or fewer and must be able to demonstrate the rural characteristics of their location and support from a diverse cross-section of community members and institutions.
Online applications must be submitted by October 1, 2020. Specific grant guidelines and application procedures are available on the Fund’s website.
HAND Foundation Invites LOIs for Programs Preventing Child Abuse
Deadline: October 1, 2020
The HAND Foundation is an advisory, advocacy, and grantmaking organization dedicated to building better communities and supporting the growth and advancement of individuals. To advance this mission, the foundation is inviting Letters of Inquiry from organizations working to reduce and prevent child sex abuse.
Criteria:
- Organizations focused on preventing abuse through programs and media that provide tools for identifying potential threats are eligible for a grant.
- The foundation does not fund political and politically focused initiatives, including attempts to influence legislation, startups at the idea stage, travel expenses unrelated to the grant, and individuals.
- To be eligible, applicants must be tax exempt under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.
The foundation typically invests up to $750,000 per year, with individual grant investments ranging from $5,000 to $150,000.
Letters of Inquiry are due October 1. Upon review, applicants may be requested to submit additional documentation and/or conduct a phone interview and will be notified if a full proposal is needed.
See the HAND Foundation website for complete program guidelines, application instructions, and previously awarded grants.
Center for Craft, Creativity, & Design Invites Applications for Research Projects
Deadline: October 1, 2020
The Center for Craft, Creativity, & Design is inviting applications for its Craft Research Fund Project Grant. Through the program, grants of up to $15,000 will be awarded in support of scholarly craft research in the United States.
Criteria:
- To be eligible, applicants must be age 18 or older and able to receive taxable income in the U.S. for the duration of the grant.
- Proposals are welcome from academic researchers and independent scholars for research-related expenses, including travel, honoraria for contributors, salary for independent researchers, and/or support documentation such as images or rights for the use of images or text as part of the research yet to be completed.
- The awards are not for the printing or dissemination of already-completed research.
- Examples of scholarly craft research eligible for support include research that provides new insight into work by historical or contemporary craft artists in the U.S. or a U.S. territory; projects that present a new understanding of the relationship between hand-made production and digital technologies; contributions to the history of the studio craft movement in the United States; projects that place American craft in a global context; and other topics that offer fresh perspectives within the field.
See the Center for Craft, Creativity, & Design website for complete program guidelines and application instructions.
Stem Talent Challenge
Deadline: October 14, 2020
EDA is seeking applications from eligible applicants to create and implement innovative science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) apprenticeship models that complement their respective region’s innovation economy. The STEM Talent Challenge is authorized under Section 28 of the Stevenson-Wydler Technology Innovation Act of 1980 (15 U.S.C. § 3723).
The STEM Talent Challenge seeks to develop or expand regional workforce capacity to support high-growth, high-wage entrepreneurial ventures, industries of the future (which usually includes industries that leverage emerging technologies), and other innovation driven businesses that have a high likelihood of accelerating economic competitiveness and job creation in their respective regions and in the United States.
The STEM Talent Challenge is designed to help communities with two activities – planning and development, and program implementation. A total of $2 million has been appropriated for this program and EDA invites applications that maximize impacts across both activities within this program, though planning and development activities are optional.
APPLICANT RESOURCES
- Apply here for the 2020 STEM Talent Challenge
- 2020 STEM Talent Challenge NOFO (PDF)
- 2020 STEM Talent Challenge 1-pager / executive summary
- STEM Talent Challenge Informational Webinar
- STEM Talent Challenge Informational Webinar Slides (PDF)
- 2020 Budget Template example
CLICK HERE to view the informational webinar for this new EDA program.
National Science Foundation: 20-610 CISE Community Research Infrastructure
Deadline: January 28, 2021
The Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE) Community Research Infrastructure (CCRI) program drives discovery and learning in the core CISE disciplines of the three participating divisions [(Computing and Communication Foundations (CCF), Computer and Network Systems (CNS), and Information and Intelligent Systems (IIS)] by funding the creation and enhancement of world-class research infrastructure.
This research infrastructure will specifically support diverse communities of CISE researchers pursuing focused research agendas in computer and information science and engineering. This support involves developing the accompanying user services and engagement needed to attract, nurture, and grow a robust research community that is actively involved in determining directions for the infrastructure as well as management of the infrastructure.
The CCRI program supports three classes of awards:
- Planning Community Infrastructure (Planning) awards support planning efforts to engage research communities to develop new CISE community research infrastructures (Planning).
- Medium Community Infrastructure (Medium) awards support the creation of new CISE community research infrastructure or the enhancement of existing CISE community research infrastructures with integrated tools, resources, user services, and research community outreach to enable innovative CISE research opportunities to advance the frontiers of the CISE core research areas. The Medium award class includes New (New) and Enhance/Sustain (ENS) awards.
- Grand Community Infrastructure (Grand) awards support projects involving significant efforts to develop new CISE community research infrastructures or to enhance and sustain an existing CISE community research infrastructure to enable world-class CISE research opportunities for broad-based communities of CISE researchers that extend well beyond the awardee organization(s).
Criteria:
- Proposals may be submitted by the following: Nonprofit, non-academic organizations: Independent museums, observatories, research labs, professional societies and similar organizations in the U.S. associated with educational or research activities.
- Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs) – Two- and four-year IHEs (including community colleges) accredited in, and having a campus located in the US, acting on behalf of their faculty members.
Current Closing Date for Applications: Jan 28, 2021.
CLICK HERE for more information and to apply.
2021 Culture of Health Prize
Deadline: October 15, 2020
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) Culture of Health Prize (the Prize) elevates the compelling stories of places where residents are working together to transform education, jobs, transportation, housing, and more so better health flourishes for all. A Culture of Health recognizes that where we live—such as our access to affordable homes, quality schools, good jobs, and reliable transportation—affects how long and how well we live.
Learn more about how you can be one of our next Culture of Health Prize-winning communities by reviewing an informational webinar recording and slides.
Listen to a Prize Alumni webinar recording to hear representatives from Prize communities share their insights on the value of winning the Prize.
PURPOSE
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Culture of Health Prize recognizes communities working at the forefront of advancing health, opportunity, and equity for all.
SELECTION CRITERIA
There are characteristics shared by communities that catalyze and sustain positive change. Because the Prize recognizes whole communities, applicants must think beyond their own individual organizations and initiatives to what has been accomplished across the community. Reviewers use the following criteria as the lens to evaluate all applications.
Herb Block Foundation Invites LOIs for Projects to Defend Basic Freedoms
Deadline: October 6, 2020 (Letters of Intent)
When Herb Block died in October 2001, he left $50 million and instructions to create a foundation that would encourage the art of editorial cartooning and support charitable and educational programs that promote and support the causes he championed during his seventy-two years of cartooning. As such, the Herb Block Foundation is committed to defending basic freedoms, combating all forms of discrimination and prejudice, and improving the condition of the poor and underprivileged.
To help advance this mission, the foundation welcomes applications for its Defending Basic Freedoms program. Through the program, grants of up to $25,000 will be awarded to projects aimed at safeguarding basic freedoms guaranteed in the Bill of Rights, eliminating any form of prejudice or discrimination, and assisting government agencies in being more accountable to the public.
To be eligible, applicants must be tax exempt as defined by section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.
Letters of Intent are due October 6. Upon review, selected applicants will be invited to submit a full proposal by November 12, 2020.
For complete program guidelines and application instructions, see the Herb Block Foundation.
2020 TIP Office Notification of Funding Opportunity – Statement of Interest
Current Closing Date for Applications: Sep 28, 2020
Funding Opportunity Number: SFOP0007256
The Department of State Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons (TIP Office) announces an open competition for 2020 projects to combat trafficking in persons outside of the United States. This funding opportunity announces the beginning of the 2020 open and competitive process to award grants or cooperative agreements. In this stage, applicants submit a Statement of Interest (SOI), which is a three-page summary of each proposed project. Applicants must submit separate SOI applications for each country or regional project identified in this funding opportunity if pursuing multiple grants. Following a technical review and a formal review of each SOI that passes the technical review, selected applicants will be invited to submit full proposals, which will be formally reviewed by the TIP Office and by an inter-agency selection panel for potential funding.
Eligible Applicants: Others (see text field entitled “Additional Information on Eligibility” for clarification)
Additional Information on Eligibility: Organizations eligible to apply include U.S.-based and foreign non-profits, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), for-profit organizations, institutions of higher education, and public international organizations (PIOs). For-profit organizations are not permitted to generate profits from grant-funded activities. U.S. government agencies may respond to this Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) with proposals for projects that would be funded through an Interagency Acquisition Agreement. While foreign governments are not eligible to apply, governments may be beneficiaries of programs provided that funding does not pay salaries of government agency personnel and that such assistance is not restricted by U.S. law or policy.
Link to Opportunity in SAMS Domestic
Family Self-Sufficiency Demonstration Development Grants
Estimated Application Due Date: May 20, 2021
Opportunity Number: HHS-2021-ACF-OPRE-PE-1944
NOTE: This is a Forecasted Opportunity.
OPRE forecasts a funding opportunity announcement (FOA) for cooperative agreements for Family Self-Sufficiency Demonstration Development Projects. Through this FOA, OPRE is seeking eligible entities that serve low-income families with children to implement a coordinated, client-centered approach to improving employment and other outcomes for participants in order to build the capacity and reduce dependency of individuals who participate in safety net programs. OPRE seeks applicants who can develop innovative approaches that rely on coordination among multiple programs, agencies, and funding sources in order to find ways to overcome the limitations of our current safety net programs and to improve family outcomes with respect to education, employment, health, food security, financial security, and social capital. Recipients will work with a federally funded, third-party evaluation technical assistance provider to develop a logic model and a plan to participate in an evaluation of their demonstration projects. These 24-month cooperative agreements, with two 12-month budget periods, will fund a planning phase and, if appropriate, pilot studies to assess readiness for evaluating the demonstrations. It is expected that work conducted under this grant could lead to future opportunities for large-scale evaluations of TANF-focused and workforce development demonstration projects.
Eligible Applicants: Nonprofits having a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education; Independent school districts; Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized); Public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities; Small businesses; For profit organizations other than small businesses; Native American tribal organizations (other than Federally recognized tribal governments); Public and State controlled institutions of higher education; Nonprofits that do not have a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education; Special district governments; State governments; County governments; City or township governments; Private institutions of higher education; Others (see text field entitled “Additional Information on Eligibility” for clarification)
Additional Information on Eligibility: Faith-based and community organizations that meet the eligibility requirements are eligible to receive awards under this funding opportunity announcement. Applications from individuals (including sole proprietorships) and foreign entities are not eligible and will be disqualified from competitive review and from funding under this announcement.
Grantor Contact Information: Amelia Popham, (202) 401-5322, Amelia.Popham@ACF.hhs.gov
Small Business Relief and Recovery Fund
The purpose of this fund is to reimburse small businesses and nonprofits for costs incurred from business interruption due to Emergency Proclamations and help small businesses and nonprofits implement safety precautions to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Click to see updates and changes to the program.
COVID-19 Services Proposal Application
The City and County of Honolulu Department of Community Services in partnership with Hawaiʻi Community Foundation, is administering CARES Act funding to serve vulnerable individuals and communities experiencing unique hardship due to COVID-19. They welcome nonprofit organizations providing or wanting to provide services to these communities in response to COVID to submit a project proposal for consideration.
Download the application and return the completed application to DCS@honolulu.gov. Please also email to discuss any questions. Please note that due to the federal requirements, eligible expenses are those that occur between May 11th and November 30th and are processed on a cost-reimbursement basis.
Click here for the City & County of Honolulu COVID-19 Services Proposal Application.