Funding Opportunities for Your Community in 2021: An Overview of What’s Ahead

DARYL FOX: Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to today's webinar, “Funding Opportunities for your Community in 2021: An Overview of What's Ahead.” Hosted by the Bureau of Justice Assistance. At this time, I would like to introduce today's presenters. Vince Davenport, Associate Deputy Director for the Law Enforcement Division. Thurston Bryant, Senior Policy Advisor for the Bureau of Justice Assistance. We will begin today's webinar.
VINCE DAVENPORT: Greetings on behalf of BJA Director Kendel Ehrlich and Deputy Director Silas Darden and Kristen Mahoney. And thank you all for taking time to join us today. The overarching objective of today's webinar is to make you aware of funding opportunities, some of which are available now and others that are anticipated in the coming weeks. Given concerns of time, we will not be able to go into depth on each program but we will provide you with enough information so that you can identify and flag certain funding opportunities that may be of interest to you and to your community. You can then visit our website for detailed information about all programs.
And before I start, I would be remiss if I didn't take just a minute to recognize the challenging times that we find ourselves in as members of the criminal justice and public safety family. We find ourselves facing an ongoing worldwide pandemic, a devastating opioid crisis, growing mental health challenges, and diminished public confidence in law enforcement. The professions and disciplines of those on today's call represent the frontlines dealing with these unprecedented and highly complex problems. Many of the funding opportunities that you will hear about today are directly responsive to these challenges and can augment your local efforts. So to everyone on this call, especially those of you on the frontline, in harm's way, thank you for all that you do to keep us safe. So now let's talk about how we can help bring federal resources to your community.
BJA is proud to support our nation's law enforcement, state, local, and tribal criminal justice agencies, with the expressed purpose of reducing crime and strengthening communities.
One of the most important ways that we do this is by providing grants to agencies and communities in order to support local efforts. We do our best to design programs that are responsive to real world challenges and provide maximum flexibility for local implementation. BJA is committed to streamlining the application process and minimizing the administrative burden of managing our grants. We've made real progress in recent years in these areas and it's never been easier to apply for and manage BJA grants. So in other words, do not be intimidated by the process for things that you need to be an experienced grant manager to successfully apply for BJA
funding. If you have the desire to apply, we have the support to help you succeed. It is however important that you do not procrastinate once a solicitation is open. Waiting until the last week to apply may not leave you enough time to gather the necessary information and documentation needed for the application. We want you to succeed, so please start early.
So there are two types of grants, there's discretionary and formula grants. And for the discretionary grant, applicants typically apply directly to OJP or BJA. These grants are typically competitive and they're—and the awards are based on predetermined review processes and the availability of funding. For most programs, we see—we receive more applications than we actually have funding which is understandable because there's really just such a big demand out there. And so we try to fund the strongest proposals based on objective review criteria.
Formula grants are typically awarded on a non-competitive basis, now what this means is that typically every eligible applicant receives some amount of funding. And the amount of funding for this—for a specific agency or jurisdiction, it can vary based on a variety of factors which tend to include population crime rates and other considerations. Some formula grants are administered by State Administering Agencies or SAA. If you don't have an active relationship with your SAA, you should really start one today. And if you don't know who your SAA is you can find a complete list on our website.
So now let's talk about 2021 funding opportunities. And we've done our best to try to group these by topic areas. The first program to tell you about is the Comprehensive Opioid Stimulant and Substance Abuse Program or COSSAP. Very few communities have been spared by the effects of substance abuse. Substance abuse and mental health are two of the most often-cited challenges for jurisdictions whether large or small, urban or rural. COSSAP supports efforts to reduce overdose death, promote public safety, and support access to treatment and recovery services.
There are nine purpose areas that can accommodate proposals at various entry points across the criminal justice spectrum to include alternatives to incarceration, law enforcement-led diversion, recovery and support services, and medicated-assisted treatment, just to name a few. COSSAP allows you to craft a proposal that is right for your community and responsive to your needs. The average award amount for the COSSAP program is around $1 million.
The next program is the Justice and Mental Health Collaboration Program. This program seeks to increase public safety by facilitating collaboration among criminal justice, mental health and substance abuse treatment entities.
The goal is to increase access to mental health and other treatment services for individuals with mental illness or co-occurring mental illness and substance abuse disorders. Example projects include, but are not limited to, mental health courts or other court-based programs, and programs that support cooperative efforts of public safety officials and service providers to connect individuals with treatment and social services. Average award amounts for this program is $550,000.
The Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant or JAG, this is a flagship program for BJA. And many of you are probably already familiar with this. In general, JAG funds can be used to provide additional personnel, equipment, supplies, contractual support, training, technical assistance, and other information systems, so long as the proposed items fall under one of the eight purpose areas that you see on this slide. Most JAG funding is managed by—not—that's probably an overstatement, not most, some of the JAG funding is managed by State Administering Agencies or your SAAs. So in some cases, that's where you'll need to apply and that's why it's important to have those relationships with the SAAs to make sure that you're in the loop and have timely information about current opportunities. Some jurisdictions can also apply directly to BJA for JAG assistance, depending on certain criteria and this can be complex in some situations so it's important that you check our website for more information on this. In other instances, jurisdictions may be able to pool JAG funding to support a shared or regional initiatives. For these types of funding opportunities with the JAG program, your SAA really is a good subject matter expert and can be a terrific resource for you.
The Smart Policing Initiative provides funding to support or test promising initiatives and practices aimed at a community's pressing crime problems. The idea behind SPI is to promote creativity to not only enhance current best practices but really to discover what the next practices are. So that law enforcement and policing can evolve and become more effective. So if there's something that you're doing in your agency today that is you think is unique and that it holds promise or something that you've been thinking about doing that you believe holds promise for the rest of the law enforcement community, this really is a great program that you should consider applying for. Funds can be used for new personnel, overtime, software, hardware, and other allowable items to support the project. One kind of a new feature this year is that Congress has asked us to—has asked the Department of Justice to prioritize applications for the development of real time crime centers in jurisdictions with high violent crime and high gun crimes. Award amounts for this program are $500,000.
The Body-Worn Camera Program, this is a very popular program. Body-worn cameras are increasingly seen as must-haves for law enforcement and, you know, you look around the country, a lot of communities are really demanding that their police departments adopt and utilize—adopt policies and utilize these cameras. BJA funds the purchase of body-worn cameras that are implemented as part of a comprehensive Body-Worn Camera Program. And for those of you that have waded into the body camera waters before, you know that this can be layered with complexity. There are a lot of considerations beyond just the purchase of the camera. There are digital storage costs and strategies that have to be worked out. There are privacy concerns and other considerations. And the good news is is that our Body-Worn Camera Program provides much more than just the funding for the purchase of the cameras. BJA has a body-worn camera toolkit and a clearing house website for agencies interested in planning and implementing a Body-Worn Camera Program. So whether you're just starting from scratch or you're looking to enhance an existing program, our body-worn camera clearing house has a wealth of resources. Check our website for more information. Amounts for this program, they vary depending upon the agency size but the award amounts range from $10,000 to $2 million.
Next is the STOP School Violence Program. This program provides funding to support threat assessments, mental health training, anti-bullying training, and other activities to promote a positive school climate. The ultimate goal of this program is to provide students and teachers with resources to recognize and prevent school violence. And regardless of which discipline or which profession you're in or where you are in the criminal justice spectrum, this comment not only applies to this program but I think all of the programs that we're talking about today, although it may not apply directly to your current position, be mindful of others that you—that you have in your professional network or your community that you communicate with. And if this program doesn't apply to you, be sure to share this information with someone else in your professional network that could make good use of it. And I say that because I view the STOP Safety—the STOP School Violence Program as a program that really every community should apply for. These funds are important. They help to keep our children safe and there's really no reason why every community shouldn't apply for these funds. We also encourage you to visit the COPS Office website. They administer a companion program for—to this program that is—it's really—it's focused on doors, locks, cameras, and other target-hardening measures. And again, every community can benefit from this program.
Next is the Crime Gun Intelligence Centers Program. This is a really important tool for communities experiencing high gun-related violent crime. The purpose is to encourage local jurisdictions to work with their ATF partners to identify firearms that are used
unlawfully and their sources. And the ultimate objective obviously is to identify those perpetrators and to prosecute them. The Crime Gun Intelligence Centers utilize the
—utilize NIBIN, that's the National Integrated Ballistics Imaging Network, which many of you are probably familiar with or maybe you—at least you've heard about that. Awards for this program are up to $700,000.
The Emmett Till Cold Case Investigations Program is obviously named in honor of Emmett Till, a young man who was brutally murdered in 1955. And the—and the purpose of this program is to support the investigation and the prosecution of racially motivated cold case murders and to support victim's families and stakeholders impacted by these cases. The only caveat here is that the funding is limited to those cases where a death occurred prior to 1980.
The next program is IPEP. This is the Intellectual Property Enforcement Program. This program is designed to protect public health, safety, and our nation's economy from counterfeit and pirated goods. Funding under this program can be used to cover expenses to establish task forces to conduct investigations, forensic analysis, to acquire equipment to conduct the investigations, and funding to support prosecution. The aim—kind of the overarching aim is to protect—or to prevent rather, deter, and identify criminal violations of IP laws. Project Safe Neighborhoods. This is probably—this is a program where many of you have not only heard about, you probably participated in your—in your own communities. This is a nationwide initiative that brings communities together to identify pressing violent crime problems in a community and to develop comprehensive solutions to address them.
PSN initiatives are led by U.S. Attorney's Offices which bring together federal and local law enforcement, prosecutors, and community leaders, and other stakeholders for a holistic community-wide approach. We encourage you to reach out to your U.S. Attorney's Office if you'd like to be involved. I'll also take this opportunity to really kind of tout the role that U.S. Attorney's Offices play not only just for federal assistance but for so many other really important resource—federal resources that are available. Each U.S. Attorney's Office has a Law Enforcement Coordinator or an LEC if you ever hear that acronym. And the LEC is typically—they actually do quite a bit for every jurisdiction but one of the main things that they do is they facilitate information sharing with state, local, and tribal jurisdictions and agencies. So if you don't—if you're not familiar with the term LEC or you don't know who your law enforcement coordinator is, I would really recommend that you put this on your to-do list, to contact your local U.S. Attorney's Office and ask for the LEC. Just introduce yourself, tell them who you are, you know, make that connection. It's a really important relationship to have regardless of which area of the criminal justice system that you are involved in.
Prosecutors as we all know play a very—a vital role and are often underfunded and working with outdated technology and resources. So BJA Innovative Prosecution Solutions for Combating Violent Crime Program, this is also known as Smart Prosecution Program, is designed to support prosecutor offices to help them reduce case loads, improve processes, and provide modern technology to better manage and track cases. This program, like many of BJA offerings, provides a high degree of flexibility so that local jurisdictions can crack a proposal that meets their specific needs and local challenges. And I just want to say another word about that. It's really important on our end of this relationship to be mindful of the fact that not all good ideas come from Washington. We know that for sure. And that you know your community best. So wherever we can, as we develop programs to support the real time needs of the field, we do our very best to incorporate as much flexibility so that you can crack a program that looks like your community, that meets your specific needs rather than just take a one-size cookie cutter approach from Washington DC.
The next program I want to talk about is the Byrne Criminal Justice Innovation Program. This is based on the principle that sustainable reductions in serious and violent crime requires service providers and the communities they serve to partner and to collaborate. These partnerships extend to community development corporations in some cases and private businesses that are involved in local revitalization or crime fighting efforts. Funding under this program supports data-driven, community-oriented strategies to reduce crime in neighborhoods with concentrations of serious and violent crime. Average award amounts are around $900,000.
Next up is Upholding the Rule of Law and Preventing Wrongful Convictions Program. This program provides funding to support case reviews and post-conviction claims of innocence with a focus on those cases at greatest risk for error. This is a really important program which helps to identify potential systemic issues that may lead to wrongful convictions and most of all, to ensure that innocent persons are exonerated.
So that's my half of the presentation. I'm going to turn it over to my colleague Thurston Bryant who will tell you about other BJA programs.
THURSTON BRYANT: Thanks, Vince. My name is Thurston Bryant and I'm very happy and pleased to join everyone. I want to reiterate what Vince said earlier when we began the webinar. And I also want to thank all of you for continuing to be our criminal justice partners, continuing to work collaboratively with everyone and each other within your communities, and with continuing to make our nation safe. As you've seen and as you'll continue to see, BJA is positioned to provide funding opportunities that cover the entire criminal justice spectrum. The slides that I will provide information on include programs
from our corrections and reentry, drug courts, forensics, tribal justice, and other portfolios. I will note if these programs have solicitations that actually been posted for all of you to apply for. And I will also include information on what the closing dates are for those posted solicitations.
The first several slides that I'll provide information on and an overview are from our corrections and reentry portfolio. For those of you who have been—who have applied for these programs in the past, you'll see some familiarity such as a Second Chance Act and the Prison Rape Elimination Act.
The first program that I want to talk about is the Innovations in Supervision Initiative: Building Capacity to Create Safer Communities. This program provides opportunities for community corrections agencies to improve supervision outcomes for individuals that they supervise. The goal of the program is to develop, implement, and/or test strategies to improve the capacity and effectiveness of probation and parole agencies to increase probation and parole success rates and reduce the rate of recidivism for those under supervision. These efforts would reduce crime, victimization, admissions to prisons and jails and save taxpayer dollars. Under this program, BJA anticipates to make up to seven awards with an average amount of up to $715,000.
The next program that I want to talk about is the Justice Reinvestment Initiative: Reducing Violent Crime by Improving Justice System Performance. BJA has been fortunate enough to administer the Justice Reinvestment or JRI Program since around 2010. This current program that we're going to administer under 2021 will allow grantees to apply data-driven approaches to identity and respond to crime, and other public safety problems including violent crimes, develop and implement innovative responses, and invest in strategies that can decrease crime and reduce recidivism. Applicants may address the criminal justice challenge directly or explain how they will remove impediments to addressing a challenge allowing jurisdictions to have more resources for preventing crime, apprehending, and prosecuting perpetrators, ensuring efficient and effective court and pretrial decision-making, breaking down information silos, facilitating appropriate sentencing treatment and protecting community security. Under this program, it's estimated that BJA will make up to five awards and for up to $5 million.
The next program is the Swift, Certain, and Fair Supervision Program: Applying the Principles Behind Project HOPE. This program furthers this mission by reducing the number of crimes committed by people under community supervision which in turn enhances the safety of law enforcement officers and the communities that they serve, decreases readmissions to prisons and jails, and can help save taxpayer dollars. State,
local, and tribal community supervision agencies under this program will develop and test new or enhanced applications of the Swift, Certain, and Fair principles of intervention in order to reduce recidivism and improve outcomes for people under community supervision. Under this program, awards will be made for up to $700,000.
The RSAT Program like you'll see with some of our other programs that we just discussed today is a program that BJA has administered for several years. RSAT assists states with developing and implementing residential substance abuse treatment programs within state correctional facilities as well as within local correctional and detention facilities in which inmates are incarcerated for a period of time sufficient to permit substance abuse treatment. The program encourages the establishment and maintenance of drug-free prisons and jails and developing and implementing specialized residential substance abuse treatment programs that identify and provide appropriate treatment to inmates, co-occurring mental health, and substance abuse disorder, or challenges. The objectives of this program are to enhance the capabilities of states and use of local and travel governments to provide residential substance abuse treatment for incarcerated inmates, prepare individuals for a reintegration back into their communities, assist individuals and communities for the reentry process by delivering community-based treatment and other broad-based aftercare services. Please note for those of you that are interested in this program, this solicitation has posted with a closing date of March the 2nd of this year.
BJA has been working with the correctional field and administering different activities under the Prison Rape Elimination Act since 2010. This current program that you see here on this slide is for our site-based program. The goal of the PREA—the PREA, the Prison Rape Elimination Act site-based program is to assist confinement facilities to include prisons, jails, juvenile confinement facilities, community confinement facilities and police lockups and other agencies that oversee them and preventing, identifying, and responding to sexual abuse and sexual harassment in these facilities, and also to support compliance with the National PREA standards. The overall objectives of the programs are to reduce sexual abuse in confinement facilities, increase staff capacity for preventing sexual abuse in confinement facilities, promote integration of the PREA standards and to the day-to-day operations, the cultures of confinement facilities, identify and document innovative and promising practice in order to inform similar efforts across the nation, and also to create cultures of zero-tolerance of sexual abuse in confinement facilities. Under this program estimated award amounts will be made for up to $250,000. Please note that this solicitation has posted with a closing date of April 6th of this year for those of you who are interested in applying.
The next program that we want to provide an overview on within our corrections and reentry portfolio is the Combating Contraband Cell Phone Use in Prisons Program, the purpose of this program is to assist state and local governments including federally recognized Indian tribes that have detention capacity to operationalize effective and secure managed access systems in order to prevent, detect, seize, protect against, and stop the presence and use of contraband cell phones by detainees and inmates in correctional facilities. Applicants may propose to enhance or implement new physical, technical, or tactical managed access systems for these purposes. In addition, applicants are encouraged to identify strategies to educate relevant staff members and other key stakeholders about steps that they can take to address contraband cell phones as well as define a process to gather, use, and share intelligence acquired by seizing contraband cell phones. For those of you who might be interested in applying for this program, please note that this solicitation has posted with a closing date of April the 8th of this year.
The Innovations and Reentry Initiative: Building System Capacity & Testing Strategies to Reduce Recidivism provides state and local jurisdictions and Indian tribes with the resources to identify assets and gaps in their reentry systems and improve their overall approach to reentry. Under this program, applicants will develop and implement comprehensive reentry strategies to create more well-functioning reentry systems that reduce recidivism among individuals who are at medium to high risk for recidivating upon release from prisons or jails. A well-functioning system has comprehensive data collection and usage, adequate information sharing to ensure referral to the right programs and services, adequate staffing and skills to execute effective delivery as well as the community landscape with enough resources to address the needs of returning citizens. Under this program, BJA anticipates making an estimated four awards with a maximum award amount of up to $1 million.
The next couple of programs are programs that are being administered under the Second Chance Act which some of you might be familiar with who are functioning in the correctional field.
The Second Chance Act Adult Reentry Education, Employment, Treatment and Recovery Program is designed to improve correctional educational and employment services for general inmate populations and to improve treatment services for those who have substance abuse disorders. This will in turn help reduce recidivism, promote public safety and recovery, and enhance employment prospects for incarcerated adults reentering the workforce. These partnerships can also support the establishment and improvement of academic and vocational educational programs and career training programs available in prisons and jails. Overall, these efforts will improve public safety
and public health. Under this program, BJA anticipates making various categorical awards with a maximum award amount of up to $900,000. And you'll see on the slide the different—the number of awards that we anticipate in making under the different categories for this program.
The next program that we wanted to discuss is the Second Chance Act Comprehensive Community-Based Adult Reentry Program. This program provides opportunities for nonprofit service providers and tribes to implement or expand on reentry programs that demonstrate strong partnerships with corrections, parole, probation, and other reentry service providers in order to provide critical transitional services as individuals returned from incarcerations back into their communities. These partnerships should develop comprehensive case management plan that directly address criminogenic risks and needs as determined by validated tools and risk assessments and include delivery or facilitation of services. The grants may—under this program may be used for mentoring adult offenders during incarceration to transition back to community and post-release, also for transitional services to assist in the reintegration of offenders back into the community and also for training regarding individuals and victim services—I'm sorry, and victims issues. This solicitation is a little bit different from the ones that we administer under the Second Chance Act portfolio and that nonprofit organizations are able to apply for it directly for funding while the other reentry solicitations may be directed towards states, and localities, and tribes as eligible applicants. Keep in mind that nonprofits could partner with them under those other solicitations that are—that are for states and localities but they could do so as a sub-grantee under those other solicitations. And, so, for example, they were partnered with the state and locality or the tribal entity as a sub-grantee in order to provide community services. Awards under this program will be made for up to $750,000. That concludes the program slides pertaining to our corrections and reentry portfolio.
Now I want to talk briefly about our Adult Drug Court and Veterans Court Discretionary Grant Program which is another program that BJA has been fortunate enough to administer for several years. The Adult Drug and Veterans Court Discretionary Grant Program supports efforts by states, locals, and tribal courts to address the needs of individuals in the criminal justice system with substance abuse issues including targeting the needs of veterans. The goal of the program is to equip courts and other criminal justice and treatment and service providers with tools to effectively integrate evidence-based substance abuse treatment, random mandatory drug testing, equitable sanctions and incentives, and transitional services and supervised court settings with jurisdiction over high-risk high need individuals that will reduce recidivism and substance abuse and prevent overdoses and death. This includes a focus on individuals with co-occurring disorders many of whom are served in these programs.
For those of you who are interested in this program, please note that this solicitation has posted to the field with a closing date of March the 17th. Now I want to switch gears a little bit and talk about some of the other programs that we administer under BJA under a different criminal justice topic area. The next several slides will include programs administered or administered under BJA's forensic science portfolio.
For those of you who are you aware beginning last year of the fiscal year 2020, BJA expanded this forensic portfolio from solely the Sexual Assault Kit Initiative that you see here to a portfolio that now includes several additional programs transitioned from the Office of Justice Programs, National Institute of Justice, just one of our sister or partner agencies within OJP that we work closely with.
So firstly, I want to talk about—the first program that I want to talk about and provide a brief overview on is the Sexual Assault Kit Initiative or SAKI. SAKI is critical to enhancing the criminal justice response to sexual assault and ensuring justice for victims. Funding not only helps link victims to advocates in need of services, but also helps jurisdictions implement best practices and comprehensive reform to help bring perpetrators to justice and increase safety in communities by preventing future sexual assaults. The SAKI program provides funding to support multidisciplinary community response teams to inventory, track, and expeditiously test previously un-submitted sexual assault kits, collect and test lawfully owed DNA from offenders arrestees, produce necessary protocols and policies to improve collaboration among the laboratories, police, prosecutors, and victim service providers, provide resources to address sexual assault investigations and prosecutions that result from evidence and CODIS hits, Combined DNA Index System hits, produced by tested sexual assault kits, and optimize victim notification protocols and services. This program has been highly official—highly effective and one of our flagship programs among the other ones that you have seen that we're presenting on. Under fiscal year 2021 for SAKI, BJA estimates making 40 awards with an average award amount of up to $1.2 million.
The next forensic science program that I wanted to discuss is the DNA Capacity Enhancement for Backlog Reduction Program, which is a formula-based program and one of the several programs that BJA acquired in transition last year from NIJ. This program was merged years ago from the previously independently administered DNA Capacity Enhancement and Convicted Offender DNA Backlog Reduction Programs. The goals of this program are to assist eligible states and units of local government to process, record, screen, and analyze forensic DNA and/or DNA database samples, increase the capacity of public forensic DNA and DNA database laboratories to process more DNA samples, thereby helping to reduce the number of forensic DNA and DNA database samples awaiting analysis. Under this year, BJA estimates making a hundred and thirty-six awards with amounts of up to $5 million. The next forensic program that I
wanted to briefly talk about is the Prosecuting Cold Cases using DNA Program. The grantees of this program will receive funding support for the prosecution of violent crime cold cases where a DNA from a suspect has been identified, suspects may be known or unknown. And provided that DNA from a suspect or suspects have been identified, funding will support investigative activities in crime and forensic analyses that could lead to prosecution. The program provides funds to prosecute violent crime in cold cases and decrease the number of violent crime cold cases awaiting prosecution. Under this year BJA estimates making 11 awards with an estimated average amount of up to $500,000.
One of our other forensic science programs is the Paul Coverdell Forensic Science Improvement Grants Program. Now, note that Coverdell, as we call it, includes both an individual competitive and formula-based program. What you see here is the Paul Coverdell Competitive Program. The Paul Coverdell Competitive Program seeks to improve the quality and timeliness of forensic science and medical examiner or coroner services including the services provided by laboratories operated by states and units of local government. Under this year, BJA anticipates making up to nine awards for an estimated amount of up to $165,000.
BJA's Post-Conviction Testing of DNA Evidence Program assist in defraying the costs associated with post-conviction DNA testing in cases of violent felony offenses as defined by state law in which actual innocence might be demonstrated. And it may be used to identify and review such post-conviction cases and to locate, and analyze associated biological evidence. For this year under this program, BJA estimates making eight awards with an estimated average amount of up to $500,000.
The last forensic science program that I wanted to mention is the Strengthening the Medical Examiner-Coroner System Program. Investigations of violent deaths performed by medical examiner and coroners offices are vital to the criminal justice system. However, there are systematic issues with death investigation data quality and infrastructure, inadequate facilities, and inconsistent expertise levels. In addition, the ME/C community lacks adequate personnel and resources to address medico-legal death investigation needs.
To address some of these deficiencies, this program was created which provides funding for forensic pathology fellowships and projects that assist ME/C offices to seek accreditation and personnel certifications. This program not only helps to address the extreme shortage of board certified forensic pathologists in the United States, but also provides ME/C offices with the resources to become accredited and support the enhancement of medico-legal death investigations nationwide. Under this year, BJA
estimates seeking 12—making 12 awards, an estimated average amount of up to $165,000. Over the next two slides, I want to talk about two programs that are specific for our tribal justice partners and their communities.
The Coordinated Tribal Assistance Solicitation or CTAS is another program that BJA has worked with and being—been able to administer for several years. CTAS seeks to improve public safety and victim services in tribal communities. The solicitation provides fairly recognized tribes and travel consortia with an opportunity to apply for funding to aid in developing a comprehensive and coordinated approach to public safety and victimization. The grant program's outline at CTAS are referred to as Purpose Areas. Applicants may apply for funding under these purpose areas that best address tribes concerns related to public safety, criminal and juvenile justice, and response system, domestic violence, child abuse, sexual assault, and other crimes. As you'll see here, BJA oversees Purpose Areas 2, 3, 4, which support comprehensive strategic planning, programs for adult tribal justice systems from prevention and treatment to tribal courts, corrections and reentry, and strategies to address violent crime, and also to support tribal justice infrastructure investments through renovation and modular buildings. You'll see the specific breakdown for the number of awards that BJA anticipates making and those amounts in relation to the different purpose areas on the slide here.
The second specific tribal justice program that I wanted to highlight is our Tribal Civil and Criminal Legal Assistance Program. This program has received annual appropriations since around 2010. The program provides civil and criminal legal assistance to low income individuals, Indian tribes, and tribal justice systems to support the development and enhancement of tribal justice systems and access to those systems. While the goal of the program is to build and enhance capacity, improve delivery of legal services to individuals and tribes, and develop policy that improve access to tribal justice systems, funding can also support other needs of eligible tribes such as providing conflict counsel for tribes exercising enhanced sentencing authority or specialized domestic violence criminal jurisdiction authorized for the Violence Against Women Act of 2013, and also supporting veterans' legal clinics for Native American veterans. Under this year, BJA anticipates making two or more awards with an estimated award amount of up to $600,000. For those of you who are listening who might be interested in this program, please note that this solicitation has posted with a closing date of March the 24th.
The Kevin and Avonte Program: Reducing Injury and Death of Missing Individuals With Dementia and Developmental Disabilities Program supports local jurisdictions efforts to reduce the number of deaths and injuries of individuals with forms of dementia such as
Alzheimer's disease or developmental disability such as autism, that due to their condition, wander from safe communities and safe environments. And to design, establish, or operate holistic, locally-based, proactive programs to locate these individuals or prevent them from wandering from safe environments. The program provides funding to law enforcement and public safety agencies to implement locative technologies to track missing individuals and to such agencies and partnering non-profit organizations to develop or operate programs to prevent wandering, increase individual safety, and facilitate rescues. Please note that if you're interested in this program, this solicitation has been posted with a closing date of March the 3rd.
The Hal Rogers Prescription Drug Monitoring Program or PDMP enhances the capacity of law enforcement agency and public health officials to collect and analyze controlled substance prescription data and other scheduled chemical products through a centralized database administered by an authorized agency. Under this program grantees can use funds to support PDMP staff including data analyst, epidemiologists, support program evaluation upon contracts with vendors to operate a state PDMP program, connect to other states and other health systems, or otherwise, enhance the capabilities of a PDMP. If interested, please note this solicitation has been posted with a closing date of March the 5th of this year. This is a program—this is a loan repayment program for those of you who might be unaware.
The goal of the John R.—or John RJ Justice Grant Program, which is also referred to as the John R. Justice Student Loan Repayment Program is to offer an incentive for all states and territories to be able to attract, recruit, and retain talented and eligible local, state, and federal public defenders as well as local and state prosecutors by setting up and maintaining a student loan repayment assistance program for attorneys with the most student loan financial burden who agreed to commit to an extended employment in public interest law and this will—as I mentioned earlier, for a minimum of 36 months. Please note that this solicitation is currently open with a closing date of March the 2nd.
That concludes the slides in terms of information on our specific programs. But stay tuned because we still want to provide you some additional resources and information that may be able to further assist your needs.
What we did not discuss during today's presentation on the specific programs, there are typically national training and technical assistance providers or TTA providers that are associated with most of these programs. So among these various services that the TTA provider provides to the grantees in the field is to help to assist the grantees with achieving their project goals and performance measurement and other—provide lessons learned to the grantees from the field and across grantees and other types of
the viable resources. So we suggest that you—in addition to examining these funding opportunities that you take a look at some of those TTA providers that are associated with those specific grant programs.
We also previously noted that some of these solicitations have been posted for the field. However, for those solicitations that have not yet been posted or released, please note that the solicitation release dates are still pending and are on a rolling basis. Stay abreast on when those funding opportunities will be made available. It's suggested that you subscribe under BJA's website in order to receive electronic email notification on when those funding opportunities and other significant BJA news and resources will become available. And one of the next slides will provide a link for BJA's main webpage so that you can use that information successfully to stay on top of what's coming out. In relation to the application submission deadlines, we typically post our solicitations for at least 60 days. However, this timeframe may vary and some solicitation may be posted for a longer period of time. I just want you guys to be aware of that.
This next slide does quickly talks about DOJ's Program Plan. For those of you who aren't aware, this is a great resource because what we've talked about during our presentation, our funding opportunities for BJA, the DOJ Program Plan, what it does is it provides information on anticipated funding resources across the entire federal government.
So you heard Vince earlier talk about how BJA, which is located within OJP, is one of the three main grant components in addition to the COPS Office, and the Office on Violence Against Women. Once you access the DOJ Program Plan, it will show you solicitations and funding opportunities that are coming up from all three main grant components, so that includes also within OJP the other bureaus in addition to BJA that provide grant funding to the field. So this is a wonderful mechanism for you to kind of stay on top of what might be coming out, and also to kind of address the needs for your different agencies and your jurisdictions.
I mentioned that there might be some other opportunities from the other grant components. What I suggest is that you access their main websites and then they will have a subscribe button so that you can also become aware of funding opportunities that are coming out from COPS and from the Office on Violence Against Women, similar to BJA.
The—this is just a one-page listing of the different resources that you might be unaware of. The first one is the BJA website. I kind of mentioned that if you go onto the BJA website on the main page, in the upper right-hand corner, there is a subscribe link.
What we suggest is that you go ahead and click on that. It's as simple as putting in your email address so that when these funding opportunities become available, you'll receive a email notification on not only that, but some other exciting resources and activity that BJA is engaged in. All that information will be provided to you electronically. The second link here, the OJP Grant Funding Resources page, this will enable you to go and access funding opportunities that are coming up from the other bureaus within OJP in addition to BJA.
The next link that you see there is Grants.gov. Now, Grants.gov is great because it provides funding information across the entire federal government, not just BJA or not just the Justice Department. For example, for our partners who are on the phone who are interested in corrections and or reentry, DOJ for a number of years through BJA and our sister agency, the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention have administered Second Chance Act reentry and correctional funding opportunities. However, we've worked collaboratively with the—our partners at the Department of Labor and the Department of Health and Human Services for a number of years. And so if you're interested in reentry, for example, you can go on to Grants.gov. It will provide funding opportunities for these other federal agencies, such as Department of Labor, Department of Health and Human Services, they might be able to fit your needs outside of the Justice Department. Thereby, that enables you to not only utilize the resources from the Justice Department, but also from these other federal agencies in cope—in like a collectional effort to address all the needs to make your communities and your jurisdictions safer.
This JustGrants link here is there to help you modernize and improve the functionality of the Grants Management System. As you are aware—may be aware, JustGrants replaced OJP and OVW's current Grants Management System, GMS, which we used for a number of years, as well as the next generation system used by the COPS Office. JustGrants is streamlined into—in Grants Management System that provides applicants and grantees with improved user experience throughout key parts of the grants management life cycle. And JustGrants will continue to evolve and improve overtime moving forward and the DOJ will also continue to enhance the system's functionality to bring even more benefits to applicants, grant recipients, and DOJ personnel.
Lastly, these last two, the OJP Award data, this is a great resource tool for you to kind of go on to see, like, what funding is actually out there and the different jurisdictions across the country and within your area. And so there might be a lot of money that's out there that you're unaware of, especially in these key criminal justice topic areas that you might be involved in. And so that'll allow you to kind of see, like, where that money has gone to, and then that will enable you to kind of do some outreach, make some
connections, and establish some partnerships potentially with those groups so that you can kind of collectively address your needs in the future.
Lastly, CrimeSolutions.gov is a website-based clearinghouse of programs and practices that have been rated in terms of effective—effectiveness in addressing different criminal justice issues. So you can go and access the CrimeSolutions website and then you can, like, surf for different criminal justice areas whether it's re-entry or law enforcement, or what have you. And then you can look at some of these projects that have—that have occurred in these programs, and see how effective they have been with providing treatment and other different provisions to the community. And then that will maybe allow you to get some ideas for maybe using some of that information to answer your own jurisdictions and some of your own projects.
Lastly, this is a—this is a—just like a link aside really quickly I want to provide you. This is another resource that enables you to access previously recorded webinars. So for example, the webinar that we're doing right now will be archived on here if there's some from prior time periods that you're interested in, you can go on there and you can access those.
We mentioned that next—that because next Thursday, the 21st, is going to be like an additional webinar. Once that's concluded, you can go on there and listen to that recording and examine that transcript. Because—this is great because this allows not only you but then your colleagues who might not have been able to participate in the webinar while it was going live to actually go back and listen to that information.
This is my last slide and then I'm going to turn it over to my partners. But this is just a slide where we want to kind of encourage and thank you all for maybe volunteering to be peer reviewers. OJP and BJA are always looking for new peer reviewers to provide their expertise and help OJP expand its peer review database. So if you're interested, dust off your resume, take at a look at the information here, and provide that to the email address that you see on the screen. We want to thank you in advance if you're able to do so by helping us to routinely expand our database and use your expertise in evaluating our projects for funding. At this time, I'm going to turn it over to our host who will complete the presentation and then we will go from there and answers your questions. Thank you.
MARY JO GIOVACCHINI: Hi, everybody. There's just a couple more slides that we're going to go over before we get to the question and answer portion. As previously mentioned at the beginning of the webinar, there will be another BJA webinar next week on Thursday the 21st at 1:00 P.M. The title is "The Funding Process: First Steps to
Applying, How to Prepare Now, and Other Considerations." This webinar would be—is a great complement to the one that is currently going on and it's going to go over the necessary steps to apply, how to navigate Grants.gov, as well as the new JustGrants, and the differences between those two things. And they're actually going to walk through a little bit of the JustGrants process. You can register for this webinar by going to the BJA website, bja.ojp.gov, selecting the Events tab which is located at the top right-hand of the screen—your web—your website screen, and then clicking on Funding Webinars. It should be the second webinar listed, if you click on that then you can go to the registration page.
We obviously want you to stay to BJA, and a great way to do that is to sign up for the BJA emails. You can now text to subscribe. You can send a text message to 468-311, and insert your email address. Just please note that message and data rates may apply. BJA also has a presence on Facebook and Twitter. The URL is for those two items that are on listed on the slide that you are looking at right now. And, again, you can visit the BJA website to sign up for their funding—to look for funding opportunities, publications, and other initiatives.
If you have questions after today's webinar about—specifics about a solicitation, you can reach out to the Response Center. Their information is listed in many of the solicitations as a contact and you can email them at [email protected]. They also have a toll-free number, 800-851-3420, as well as a line for hearing impaired301-240-6310. The Response Center is open 10:00 A.M. to 6:00 P.M. Eastern Time Monday through Fridays and they are open later on the day a solicitation closes.
In addition, they also offer a weekly funding newsletter that I highly recommend that you subscribe to. As I mentioned, it's weekly. It comes out each Friday. It does announce all the new funding opportunities from BJA, as well as the other agencies within the Office of Justice Programs. It's a great way to stay on top of what is coming out when there are webinars such as this one, our webinar specific to a solicitation that will be occurring. To subscribe to that, you go to the NCJRS website, ncjrs.gov. You can go to the bottom—the center section that's talking about funding. And then at the bottom of that, you'll see Subscribe to Funding news from NCJRS. If you click on that, you can subscribe to that weekly newsletter.
So at this time, we are going to turn over the webinar and start answering the many, many questions that we have received from you all.
DARYL FOX: All right. Before we get into the actual questions asked within the portion, I will want to reiterate since we got this several times throughout and that is the
recording, transcript, and PowerPoint for today's webinar will be posted to the BJA website at approximately 10 business days. So, certainly be on the lookout for that for a follow-up and for our cover purposes. So with that, we can just kind of go in order here as the questions came in, Vince, Thurston, just be mindful of your mute button of when you want to speak and we'll just kind of go into it now. So the first one is, "I cannot currently find the Adult Drug Court solicitation and drug JustGrants. Is that available or when will that be available?"
THURSTON BRYANT: Hi, this is Thurston, can you hear me?
DARYL FOX: Yes, we can.
THURSTON BRYANT: Okay. Hi, this is Thurston. What I would do is once you go to the main webpage of BJA, if you can't find it there, at the top of the main webpage of BJA, you'll see at the—at the top of the menu bar you'll see "Funding Opportunities." I can't think of the exact terminology because I don't have my screen open. But you'll see "Funding." If you click on that, there should be a link for "Current Funding" so that will tell you all the current full stations that have been posted. Once you go to those specific pages for that solicitation and you'll see, you know, like a—like a summary of the—of the solicitation but then also upload—I think download, that will provide you with an actual solicitation and instruction on how to get started. So if you can't find it through the other way that you're—that you're—that you just mentioned, go to the BJA website. As I said, main webpage for BJA funding opportunities, click "Current Funding" and then all the things that have been posted thus far are listed there. And don't forget, I would also—I also suggest that you subscribe to get that email notification as well. So like as we continue to roll out new programs and solicitations, the email blast will come out from our communications team to let you know that that funding opportunity is currently now available with the closing date as well.
DARYL FOX: Thank you. Next question. "Is there assistance for the application fees and then parenthesis, DUNS, D-U-N-S?"
THURSTON BRYANT: Yes, there should be. This is Thurston. What I would do is stay tuned to the webinar that we have next week on the 21st, which we'll actually get into details on how to apply under these various programs. So, that'll get into more in-depth discussion on, like, a step-by-step basis on how to apply which would include the DUNS number and all those source of parameters. You have to kind of go through those different steps. But that's, like, what I would suggest, to kind of tune in definitely for next Thursday for that. As part of that webinar, we'll have someone from our—one of our
offices who actually works on JustGrants as an expert so they'll be able to kind of answer some of those questions with more detail and they'll assist you.
DARYL FOX: Next question is, "Are police departments of private universities who have fully certified police officers working under the auspices and municipal police department eligible for direct funding and/or as subrecipients to the municipal police department? For example, body-worn cameras."
VINCE DAVENPORT: Sure, this is Vince, I'll be happy to answer that. So if you're a state accredited and a state certified police agency, law enforcement agency and you meet the state—your state's definition for that, in most cases you would be eligible just as any other police department in your state. And I just put that little caveat on there, in most cases, I would just—I would always defer to and refer you to a specific solicitation for the exact eligibility criteria. But in most cases, as long as you're recognized as a certified law enforcement agency by your state, that's good enough for us.
DARYL FOX: Next question is, "Can body-Worn Camera Program funds be used for video storage?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: So unfortunately at this time, I believe—well, first of all, the solicitation is not out yet. I know that in the past that storage has not been a covered cost under the Body-Worn Camera Program and I don't want to get ahead of the policy people who are actually working on the Body-Worn Camera solicitation that's going to be coming out soon. But as of last year, storage was not a covered cost. And we know that that's a real big issue and I know that Congress is aware of that as well. And so whether it's going to be addressed in the new solicitation or maybe in some future solicitation, that's still yet to be seen. But as of now the answer is, no.
DARYL FOX: Next question, "Are public universities eligible to apply for STOP School Violence Programs?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: That's actually a—that's actually a tricky question. So STOP School—so the STOP funding, the STOP Act really was aimed at K through 12 education and so I do know that under some circumstances that there are relationships between K through 12 school districts and institutions of higher learning, and sometimes that involves students that are actually physically on campus for example under certain circumstances. And so it generally—the answer I guess—the best answer I can give you is generally, no. However, I would, again, refer you to the solicitation once it's posted for specific eligibility criteria because there could conceivably be ways that that
could—where eligibility could be achieved. But again we'll just have to wait for the solicitation to come out.
DARYL FOX: And the next question which was answered within some of the slides. "Do you have an estimate on when these funding opportunities are going to be posted?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: I'll just say a word about that. So, you know, to subscribe to our information services, so you stay in touch with us, you know, you'll get regular emails and that, I know that there's an email that comes out I think once a week, talks about different programs, but I would really encourage you to check that every day. It's a really fluid time right now for solicitations, our policy teams and our program teams, everybody is, you know, working. It feels like day and night sometimes. But we're really working hard to get these solicitations out as quickly as possible. And, you know, truth is by the end of today, there could be additional solicitations that are—that become available that are not available at the start of this webinar. So I would just say, you know, Thurston we mentioned, the BJA website, if you just go to the BJA website, just the main website bja.ojp.gov, and you just go to—it's right smack dab in the middle of the screen at the top that says, "Fundings and Awards" and you can click on the current funding opportunities. I think at this time of year, just knowing how active this rolling process is right now if, you know, depending upon what you're looking for, I don't think it would hurt to check this every, you know, day or two or three to make sure that you don't get too far behind of what's available.
THURSTON BRYANT: Okay. And this is Thurston to piggyback off of what Vince said again. We keep mentioning to subscribe, subscribe, subscribe. I mean, Vince and myself, we're subscribed to the BJA electronic notification so whenever like a new solicitation is posted, we get that email that says, like you know, "New funding opportunities," et cetera. And so that is really a great mechanism in addition to what Vince mentioned just to kind of stay on top of the resources and the funding opportunities that BJA is putting out. Also, you know, you just want to check, too, as a precaution to make sure like, you know, that that stuff doesn't go into your spam folder or what have you, but I think between those two things, I think that's a great way to stay connected with BJA's funding opportunities for this year.
DARYL FOX: The next question, "Are all of the grant programs being discussed available now or is this a list of known or expected programs to be available?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: So the—so the list that we covered today, these are programs that we anticipate having available this year. These are program that says some of them have already posted, some of them have already hit the streets, so to speak, and
are available for applications right now. But every program that we talked about today is a program that we anticipate we will offer soon this year. And so, you know, that could change obviously. We're in the midst of changing administrations in Washington DC, as everybody knows. And so, you know, as things stand today, this is the—this is the block of programs that are scheduled to be released this year. But, again stay, tuned, stay in touch and stay informed and you'll—we'll let you know if there are any changes.
DARYL FOX: "Can you share the average grant amount and number of awards for the COSSAP Program, Comprehensive Opioid, Stimulant, and Substance Abuse Site-based Program?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: I can tell you what we did last year, so last year, I think we funded a hundred and ten sites. I think 10 of those were states, those were approximately $3,000,000 apiece and then we funded another hundred or so, I think it's a little more than a hundred sites and the average award amount, it's actually really—it's a really high amount. You know, maybe it's between $500,000 and $1,000,000. So those are really—typically those tend to be pretty big awards and, you know, because that's a big pool of money, you know, the odds of getting those awards is actually pretty good. Some of these programs are highly, highly competitive where there's just a small number of awards that are made. But COSSAP is one of those that because of the tremendous need that we all know about across the country and substance abuse, it's one where we do make quite a bit of awards. And so if it's something that's important to you, it's on your radar and it's something you want to be involved in, definitely keep your eyes open for that solicitation when it comes out and apply.
THURSTON BRYANT: Yeah, this is Thurston. One other thing I want to add is we kind of mentioned throughout the presentation that most of these programs that we discussed have a TTA provider component to them. And so that might be a National Resource Center as such. For COSSAP, there is—there's a similar one. I think if you just Google BJA, COSSAP, TTA Resource Center, there—there's—there'll be a link, you'll see our logo once you access that website. But there will be information on that website about the—about the—some of the funding over the years and some of the available resources to the field. So, those sorts of things, the TTA provider websites and things of that nature, they're great because it's not only information for the grantee, but there's also some information, some lessons learned on there that we mentioned for all of you as well. And so for COSSAP, like I said, I think if you just Google BJA, COSSAP, TTA Resource Center, I think there will be a link and you'll see our logo on that website. A lot of information on there.
DARYL FOX: And the next question was addressed a little bit earlier, but, "So if the Prosecution Grant was released yesterday, can we expect more solicitations to come out in the near future, say next week?"
THURSTON BRYANT: Yes.
DARYL FOX: Next question is, "Is CTAS going to be released this year?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: The—there—we fully expect it to be released, I'm not sure. I know that the timeline with CTAS—and I saw that question when it came in, I know that the—it's typically opened by now this time of year on the, you know, on the annual grant-making cycle. But it's—we fully expect it to be released and it could be sooner rather than later. But again I just—we're—everything again is kind of in flux right now. But I do think you could certainly I would say pretty much count on the fact that that is going to be released.
THURSTON BRYANT: Right, exactly. Plus with CTAS, you know, BJA works in conjunction with some of the other federal agencies as well. So, that solicitation is not simply as simple as BJA putting it out, it's more like a collaborative effort. So yes, we anticipate putting that out.
VINCE DAVENPORT: "We're a provider of SCD and mental health programs for courts and reentry to reduce crime our telehealth and these are use of artificial intelligence. We work with communities in courts as the applicant on many of these opportunities and are there any available for small businesses to apply directly?"
THURSTON BRYANT: So I'm not aware—I'm not aware of programs that are—where a business, you know, provider of some, you know, for-profit service or whatever could apply directly. Again, I would just, you know, I would always refer questions like that to specific solicitations where the eligibility criteria is laid out with very clear specificity.
VINCE DAVENPORT: Yeah. The other thing, too, is I mentioned the one reentry
question solicitation that we're going to put out, which is for nonprofits, because typically these are for states and local units of government and also for tribes, but that one's for nonprofits, and when I kind of talked about that, when I kind of mentioned that, even though the nonprofit organization might not be able to apply for these other ones directly, they could still be a sub-grantee, you know, like if the state or the locality actually applied, they could be a sub-grantee, same thing in the—in this situation, that could be a possibility. And then I also mentioned for some of the corrections and reentry work to look outside of DOJ because there are other federal agencies that
provide grant funding to that specific purpose area, I mentioned the Department Of Labor, Health, and Human Services. For example, the Department of Labor, they will have solicitations for nonprofits or FBCO, Faith-Based Community Organizations, and so I would, you know, check on Grants.gov to see like if there's something outside of DOJ or outside of what we administer to, like, if there's something that fits your needs but then perhaps as a sub-grantee, you'll be able to maybe receive funding and help to provide treatment services in that realm versus receiving it directly.
DARYL FOX: Next question, "Does your organization need to have an ORI number to apply? If so, how do you obtain such a number?"
THURSTON BRYANT: This is Thurston. I'm unsure. That's a question that I would definitely tune in for next week when we talk about how to apply. I think that's something that could be definitely answered, I don't want to say definitely, but I think that's something that would fall along the lines of the subject area for next week's webinar on how to apply and some of the specific steps for that, but I don't—I don't—I don't have that answer directly. I'm not sure.
VINCE DAVENPORT: Yeah, this is Vince. I know that at one point, I know the COPS Office, and there may be other DOJ components that required an ORI number, but that's really, I think, changing and so Thurston's answer is spot on, definitely tune in next week and we can be sure to address that.
DARYL FOX: Back to the COSSAP Program, "Are they accepting applications from 501(c)(3) nonprofits along with the Justice and Mental Health Collaboration Program?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: So the primary—the primary recipients and eligible applicants are states, tribes, and units of local government for those programs. However, it's very common for other entities that are not states, tribes, and local governments to be sub-grantees and subawardees. And so again, it is really is a case by case, but in most cases, you have to be, especially for COSSAP for example, you have to be a state, tribe, or a government to apply.
DARYL FOX: And this was addressed generally, but worth just reiterating for the moment. "Where exactly can I find the application for the Body-Worn Camera Program and also is there a due date?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: Yeah, it's just—it's just not—it's not out yet. Again, if you just subscribe to the information services that we offer, you'll get a notice as soon as it's released or you could just check our website as often as you want, right smack dab in
the middle of the page at the top where it talks about funding opportunities, but it's—we expect it to be released sometime soon, but I just—we just don't have a specific date right now.
DARYL FOX: "Are there any related programs to develop and implement an ALPR capacity along with a different question, similar—along with hiring addition officers?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: So I don't know what ALRP capacity is and so I apologize and I'll turn—I'll kind of toss it back to Thurston in a second. But with regard to hiring officers, you know, one of the—there are several of our programs that do allow for hiring of new personnel for specific purposes because there's with, you know, with the solicitation but really the best source for that is the COPS Office. The COPS Office has the COPS Hiring Program and they—the COPS Hiring Program typically provides for seventy-five percent of salary and benefits over a three-year period for new hires. So, I would definitely check the COPS Office. That's really the best source of funding for that.
THURSTON BRYANT: And also in regards to that, like we kind of mentioned, I think earlier with the presentation, go to the COPS Office website, you could subscribe to receive like an email—like electronic notification on forthcoming funding opportunities from them and then also the other—the third main grant component under the Justice Department, the Office on Violence Against Women, we suggest you do that for both of those COPS and OVW just so you can, you know, if there's any information coming out without those criminal justice spectrum that kind of fits your needs.
VINCE DAVENPORT: Can I—I want to clarify. On the hiring piece, there is another really important program that I just overlooked that will provide funding for hiring and that's the JAG Program, so the Justice Assistance Grant Program. And truthfully, the JAG Program is one of those—is probably the primary program where personnel are funded. And so definitely check the JAG Program as well.
DARYL FOX: On that note on JAG, "Can nonprofit 501(c)(3) agencies apply for JAG?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: JAG funding is—typically JAG funding is only available to states, tribes, and units of local government, but again there are situations where, you know, sub-grantees or subawardees could be involved but not directly.
THURSTON BRYANT: And as a quick follow-up with Vince, we suggest you go onto our website if you go BJA JAG, we have a website for our JAG Program, you can go and look at the funding that has been provided from, like, the last several years at the state level so, you know, there's a state—there's a JAG state formula amount and then
there's a JAG local amount as well. You can go on the website, you can pull up what money went to the SAA for Virginia from last year and then you can also—there's like a chart that shows the individual locality amounts that were dispersed to those different entities for the locality piece. It's like, you know, for example, it could be like Fairfax, you know, Fairfax, Virginia and they'll say like, you know, $30,000 or what have you. And it'll tell you the money that went to what specific entity. So you can maybe try to outreach and partner with those groups as well.
VINCE DAVENPORT: And this is Vince. I want to—I know we're getting close to the time here, but there are a couple of little pieces I kind of want to close the loop on. One, if an ALPR was referring to license plate readers, ALPR's, then we do have a couple different programs that would support the purchase of that and one would be the Smart Policing, the Strategies for Policing Innovation or JAG Program as well, and you know, for questions about what's allowable and whether those could be funded, one of the best source of information really is your state and then assurance agency so just contact the—your SAA and ask those same questions. And I did confirm that we do not require an ORI number for our funding.
DARYL FOX: "Has the number of awards increased from 55 for the Adult Drug Court Grant?"
THURSTON BRYANT: I'm sorry, what's that number again? What was the question? I'm sorry.
DARYL FOX: "Has the number of awards increased from 55 for the Adult Drug Court Grant?"
THURSTON BRYANT: This is Thurston. I'm not certain off the top of my head. Well, I'm sure we have that information online in terms of what we awarded last year for example and then what is anticipated for this year. So I would suggest examining that to see like, you know, if there is like a, you know, if there's going to—if there's like an increase from what we've put out last year and then compare it to this year. And then keep in mind, the number that we put on the slides for this year is just—is an estimate but it's a—it's a—it's accurate as we—as we know right now.
DARYL FOX: "With the Tribal Civil and Criminal Legal Assistance Program, is the authorizing agency OJC or the tribe who completes the application?"
THURSTON BRYANT: This is for TICUA?
DARYL FOX: Tribal Civil and Criminal Legal Assistance Program.
VINCE DAVENPORT: Yeah, I'm not sure about that. Usually, I think it's a nonprofit and I think that's really a training in Technical Assistance Program so that wouldn't be, you know, an award per se, like a site-based award, but that's—those are Training and Technical Assistance Programs and typically they're nonprofits.
THURSTON BRYANT: Yeah. The other thing, too, for TICUA is that that solicitation is posted and so I suggest accessing that, like, you know, like we've mentioned a couple times, you can go into the BJA main webpage and look under "Current Funding Opportunities," there will be a link for TICUA. And then once you actually go to solicitation, the eligibility will be like on the first couple of pages. It's usually like on the first page of the solicitation, but that'll have some more detail for that.
DARYL FOX: Vincent, Thurston, we're a little past the ending time. I wanted to just kind of put it out to see if you wanted to keep answering a few more questions that were in or if we could address those extracting to the website and to the chat features.
VINCE DAVENPORT: Well, I want to be—I want to be as helpful as we can. I still see where we have over—we have several hundred people that are still on the call. So, let's just go maybe another five minutes if that works for Thurston.
THURSTON BRYANT: Yeah, I'm good. Sounds great. Here to help.
DARYL FOX: The next—the next question, "Will solicitation on research and development and forensic science for criminal justice purposes be open this year?"
THURSTON BRYANT: Repeat that. You said solicitation on research and—was it research on forensics?
DARYL FOX: It's the research and development in forensic science for criminal justice purposes.
THURSTON BRYANT: Yeah, if it's a research, the forensic programs that BJA is going to administer were the ones that we presented on. If it's research-related, it's going to be through the National Institute of Justice, which is one of our sister agencies within OJP. So, I would get linked in with them and to see if that's something that they're going to put out this year, but if it's a, you know, like I said, the specific of forensic science programs that BJA is going to administer, those were on the slides. If it's research-related, it's going to be through NIJ, probably through, you know, either
through their Office of Research and Evaluation or through their Investigative and Forensic Sciences Office. So I will check with NIJ. You just Google National Institute of Justice and then they'll have information on their website in terms of being subscribed, receive information about what's forthcoming. But forensic research solicitation wouldn't be one that BJA would administer.
MARY JO GIOVACCHINI: Thurston, this is actually Mary Jo. I can answer that. That is supposed to post we're not—we don't have a firm date on that one, but it is anticipated that it will be posted. And that will be through NIJ as Thurston had mentioned.
DARYL FOX: The next question. "Are we eligible to apply for any other JAG funds if we receive them locally under the formula and are eligible under our state agencies allocation?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: So, you know, with all things JAG, especially when you start talking about applying directly and then participating in formula programs at the same level, really—every state really kind of does things differently. And so I think it's incumbent on—it's incumbent to really have that conversation with your SAA just to make sure that nothing slip through the cracks and that you're taking full advantage of what's available, either through the formula program offered by the state or in addition to any direct JAG funding that an agency will be eligible for as well, but it really is a—it really is a state's issue and that's why it's so important to have that relationship with the SAA.
DARYL FOX: Next question. "We lost a large piece of our funding for our domestic violence officer due to COVID. Are there any emergency funding sources we might be able to tap into? We are very rural and don't have many options."
VINCE DAVENPORT: Hmm. Well, you know, if it's personnel again, you know, JAG is always an option there. I'm sure that there are other federal agencies that may have some assistance there. I think it's important to note, and I'll just take the occasion with this question to note that one of the top priorities for the Department of Justice this year really has been trying to respond to the needs of smaller agencies, in particular in rural law enforcement. And so I know that that's a priority not just for the Department of Justice, but I think government-wise. So, you know, other than JAG and depending upon what the role and function of that officer was, perhaps the COPS Office for Officer Hiring Program, but I would also explore Grants.gov for other federal opportunities that might kind of fill that need. And there's also the Coronavirus Emergency Supplement Award, and that is something that the SAA could absolutely assist with. So that could—
that particular need could be met by the SAA through The Coronavirus Emergency Supplement Award.
DARYL FOX: Was…
THURSTON BRYANT: And—real quickly, we've talked about JAG a couple of times throughout the questions, just wanted to make folks aware that later in the chat that Brenda Worthington, who's one of our Leadership Staff Members at BJA, Brenda is one of our well-versed in the JAG Program with her office having to manage that. She has posted the link for the BJA JAG Program in the chat box. And so we've mentioned taking a look at that link. We highly suggest you click on that link and then there will be a lot of information on there in terms of, like, funding that has been allocated at the state and local level across the United States, as well like allowable expenses and things of that nature. So make sure you check out the chat section to access the link for our JAG Program. Thanks, Brenda, if you're still on the line. Thanks, appreciate it.
DARYL FOX: "Was PSN mentioned as one of the grant programs that will continue?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: Yes.
DARYL FOX: Go through a couple more here. "Will there be a webinar for the Byrne Criminal Justice Innovation Program?"
THURSTON BRYANT: This is Thurston…
VINCE DAVENPORT: That's a good question. Go ahead, Thurston, please. Yes, I actually…
THURSTON BRYANT: I can say…
VINCE DAVENPORT: I just confirmed the answer is yes.
THURSTON BRYANT: Okay. I was going to say that what we typically do is like, you know, we're kind of talking broadly about programs across BJA. We're not getting into much detail. Typically what we have done over the years is, and Vince confirmed this, is that for our specific programs, when we do really—yeah, solicitation, our staff members who managed that portfolio or those programs will have a specific webinar for that specific program so Vince just confirmed that there will be one for that program, but like for example we might do that with forensics like, you know, once our programs are released, we would have a webinar for the field to talk about that specific program and
to answer questions from the field for those folks who are interested in that. So Vince confirmed that the answer is yes and so you might see that with some of the other programs as they become available.
DARYL FOX: "Are there any grants to purchase vehicles?"
THURSTON BRYANT: Yes. I mean, JAG if you—if you—if you—actually if you look at the JAG Program, but there are certain criteria and specifications for that. Go ahead, Vince.
VINCE DAVENPORT: No. No. I was going to say at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I was just going to bring up JAG again as a possibility.
THURSTON BRYANT: But make sure you look at the link that we—that Brenda had provided through Vince and within the chat because there are some—there might be some requirements for what types of vehicles those are.
DARYL FOX: "Are there any grants available for working with families of law enforcement officers who died by suicide? We're similar to the concerns of police survivors group.?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: So one of the things that—so grants, you know, that's kind of a specific question. I'm not exactly sure how to answer that other than to say that the BJA, we do have a very active role and a big footprint in this space in terms of supporting officers and helping kind of mitigate the impacts of stress on not only the officers but their families as well. We work very closely with some of our National Stakeholder Organizations like IACP, International Association of Chiefs of Police, on suicide awareness, suicide prevention programs. But I'm not aware of specific grants for the circumstances that were described.
THURSTON BRYANT: Yeah, this is Thurston. I'm not as well. I was wondering and I'm not an expert, I don't know for sure, you might want to check with the Office for Victims of Crime, OVC, which is one of our partner agencies within the Office of Justice Programs. You might want to take a look to see, like, if they have any resources or specific grant opportunities for something like that. I don't know for sure, but you might want to just maybe take a look just to kind of see.
DARYL FOX: "Will all grants eventually be part of the JustGrants site?"
VINCE DAVENPORT: Yes.
THURSTON BRYANT: Yes. That's what we kind of mentioned, that like now what we're trying to do is kind of consolidate all the DOJ Grant components from OJP, all the bureaus within OJP, the COPS Office in OVW into a centralized one-stop shop system, so that's what grant—JustGrants is going to do.
DARYL FOX: "Do you know when the Justice/Mental Health Collaboration Program will be announced?"
THURSTON BRYANT: No, not offhand. Just kind of like what we've been saying, take a look and see, subscribe, see like if—see like when that funding opportunity might become available. I was going to actually pull up our website to see like if maybe perhaps that one is listed or not. Give me one second. I'll just take a quick look.
VINCE DAVENPORT: And, Thurston, while you're doing that, although we don't—I want to go back to the question about the officer suicide. Although we don't have a particular grant program for that, we do have important resources. The one I wanted to point out is SAFLEO, S-A-F-E-L-E-O. It's underneath our VALOR for Blue Program and there's a lot of really important resources there for families that have unfortunately experienced this type of tragedy. And so again that's SAFLEO, S-A-F-E-L-E-O and it's under our VALOR for Blue program.
THURSTON BRYANT: And to get back to the—our forensic question about JMHCP, I'm on the BJA website, if you go to the main page at the top, you'll see "Funding and Awards." There's a link for available funding, which is the current funding opportunities. I do not see JMHCP currently listed, but as we've mentioned, just to continue to check back with that and to subscribe to get the notification once it does become available. As Vince mentioned, we are—we are just nonstop trying to get those opportunity docked in the field as quickly as possible, and so you'll see those things pop up like as Vince mentioned could be some more today, tomorrow, next week, what have you. We're just trying to do the best we can to get those things down as quickly as possible.
DARYL FOX: And with that, I think we will be wrapping up today's webinar. Once again, this will be posted to the BJA website within 10 business days along with the audio and PowerPoint. So please reference that. And also please reference the additional webinar. It's going to be part of this series that will be taking place on January 21st. Now on behalf of the Bureau of Justice—Vince, Thurston, did you have any last remarks?
THURSTON BRYANT: I was just going to say real quickly Vince mentioned…
VINCE DAVENPORT: Nothing for me other than thank you.
THURSTON BRYANT: Yeah, I was just going to say real quickly, Kristen Mahoney who is one of our leadership folks to the BJA, she's one of our SESs, she posted the link for the VALOR for Blue SAFLEO Program on the—within the chat section. So thanks, Kristen, for that. So if some of you are still on, you can access that link, save it, and then take a look at the resources available through that. For me, I have nothing else. I want to thank everyone like Vince did for allowing us to be a part of this. We are around to continuously help you guys. That's what we're here for. We love our work. So everyone stay safe and then, you know, we're here to help you so everyone stay safe, take care.
DARYL FOX: So on behalf of the Bureau of Justice Assistance, our panelists, thank you for joining today's webinar. This will end today's presentation.