HUD to Speed Process for Awarding Grants

By Anuradha Kher, Online News EditorWashington, D.C.–In an effort to accelerate the process of awarding grants to state and local governments, non-profit organizations and other community-based applicants, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) recently launched a new streamlined funding process.HUD will now announce funding notices on a program-by-program basis, which is expected to speed up the application process for prospective grantees that would otherwise be required to wait for the publication of HUD’s comprehensive funding notice.”This new process is intended to make certain HUD grants are awarded in a much more timely and efficient manner,” says HUD Secretary Steve Preston. “We are removing a bottleneck in the flow of critically needed funding to our applicant community and thereby accelerating the process of putting our grants to work more quickly.”HUD believes that by making this change, funding notices or Notices of Funding Availability (NOFAs) will be available earlier in the fiscal year. To assist applicants in this transformation, HUD is publishing the anticipated schedule for release of the Fiscal Year 2009 notices. The information regarding NOFA programs and schedules is subject to the availability of Congressional appropriations. As HUD receives appropriations, HUD may have to amend the anticipated dates as well as amend estimated amounts that may appear in the published NOFAs.Accelerating the grants process is a goal of Preston’s ambitious 200-day plan for improving departmental operations and delivering better services.