Funding Opportunities

Fast Pitch grants are for ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT. Activities may include:
• conference or seminar attendance
• consultants or professional speakers
• specialized staff training/certification
• professional development: coaching, leadership training, board development
• focused education on organizational development such as: strategic planning, fund or program development, needs assessment and information management
• software support such as volunteer scheduling or grant management software, database management such as Excel or Access, or other software pertinent to the development of your organization
• technology support such as a new computer, printer, or copier, used to enhance the development of your organization

Program Strategic Goals:

1. Accomplish fuels management activities on federal and non-federal land.
2. Develop and implement fire education, training, and/or community action plans/programs.
3. Conduct Community Wildfire Protection Plans (CWPPs), community wildfire assessments, and planning activities.
4. Expand community capability to enhance local employment opportunities.
5. Develop and implement short and long-term monitoring and maintenance plans for hazardous fuels reduction, community fire education and training, and community action programs.

The Five Star and Urban Waters Restoration grant program seeks to develop community capacity to sustain local natural resources for future generations by providing modest financial assistance to diverse local partnerships focused on improving water quality, watersheds and the species and habitats they support.

Projects include a variety of ecological improvements along with targeted community outreach, education and stewardship. Ecological improvements may include one or more of the following: wetland, riparian, forest and coastal habitat restoration; wildlife conservation, community tree canopy enhancement, wildlife habitat, urban agriculture and community gardens, wildlife and water quality monitoring and green infrastructure best management practices for managing run-off.

Projects should increase access to the benefits of nature, reduce the impact of environmental hazards and engage local communities, particularly underserved communities, in project planning, outreach and implementation. This program expects that applicants will represent a mixture of urban and rural communities. NFWF may use a mix of public and private funding sources to support any grant made through this program and we expect that more than half of projects awarded will engage underserved communities.

With funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, EPA’s Clean School Bus (CSB) Program provides $5 billion over five years (FY 2022-2026) to replace existing school buses with zero-emission and low-emission models. Under the Program's first funding opportunity, the 2022 CSB Rebates, EPA solicited applications for zero-emission and low-emission school buses and awarded up to $965 million to fund school bus replacements at nearly 400 schools.

In Spring 2023, EPA opened a competitive grant funding program; EPA anticipates awarding at least $400 million under the 2023 CSB Grants Program Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO). EPA expects to announce the 2023 Grant Program selectees by early 2024. In Fall 2023, EPA opened the 2023 CSB Rebates program; EPA expects to award at least $500 million in funding under the 2023 rebate program.

To gain a better understanding of environmental and public health challenges facing rural communities, EPA and our partners are launching the “Small Communities, Big Challenges” Competition. The goal of this Competition is for local governments to identify innovative and effective ways to holistically engage rural communities around environmental health issues and to identify any associated barriers to better protecting human health. Through increased engagement, this Competition would ideally help local governments and communities better identify and understand rural community-based environmental public health issues, which may help in the protection of the community’s environmental public health. EPA and our partners will use the solutions from this Competition to learn of unique or innovative strategies for engaging with rural communities and of the environmental public health issues that rural communities are faced with. Local governments that participate in the Competition will demonstrate their innovative strategies for engaging rural communities and present collaboratively identified findings from these engagements through a brief engagement strategy report and a short video.

ACF's Patagonia Regional Community Fund offers funding to organizations that have projects and programs supporting residents of Patagonia, Sonoita, Elgin, and/or Canelo.

The Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health (OASH) and the Office of Minority Health (OMH) are seeking community-led strategies and tools to address health disparities in communities disproportionately impacted by environmental risks and hazards including those related to climate change, and the cumulative impacts of other stressors. The Challenge mechanism provides an opportunity for community voices to participate in developing novel innovative approaches to addressing the adverse health impacts of environmental conditions and increase community resilience within their local, disproportionately impacted communities.

The Preservation Technology and Training (PTT) Grants are administered by the National Center for Preservation Technology and Training (NCPTT), the National Park Service’s innovation center for the preservation community. The 2024 PTT Grants are intended to create better tools, better materials, and better approaches to conserving buildings, landscapes, and cultural resources. The Grants should be seen as pushing the field of preservation forward and any application should be innovative in nature. The Grant’s scope should disseminate to the broadest audience and impact national, regional, and/or local preservation practices. 2024 Priorities. While all innovative applications will be reviewed, NCPTT’s 2024 program prioritizes grant applications with the following themes:Innovative grant applications related to the utilization of augmented reality and machine learning for innovative approaches within the field of cultural resources are strongly encouraged.Innovative grant applications involving climate change response to fire related and inland hydrological (too much water, too little water) issues and their impacts on cultural resources are strongly encouraged.Innovative grant applications applying new techniques and technologies to the preservation field from descendant communities and underrepresented communities are strongly encouraged. While NCPTT encourages applicants to address these research priorities, all grant applicants that are innovative in the field of preservation technology will be considered. Programmatic Guidance Digital Documentation: Any application for digital documentation of buildings or landscapes should go beyond the basic scanning of the cultural resource(s). Grant projects should investigate new ways to conduct, analyze, process, and disseminate digital documentation techniques, data, and use of final products. Projects that do not go beyond basic scanning of cultural resources will not be considered innovative. Symposia, conferences, and training: any application for symposia, conferences, or training, must consider how the content is disseminated to a wider audience beyond the event participants.Media: as PTT grants are federally funded, media (i.e., podcasts and webinars) should be made available for publication on NCPTT’s website for dissemination to as broad an audience as possible. PTT Grants will support the following activities:Innovative research that develops new technologies or adapts existing technologies to preserve cultural resources (typically $20,000)Specialized workshops or symposia that identify and address national preservation needs (typically $5,000 to $15,000)Media: how-to videos, podcasts, best practices publications, or webinars that disseminate practical preservation methods or provide better tools for preservation practice (typically $5,000 to $15,000) PTT Grants will not fund the following:“Brick and mortar” grants.Publications for profit during the project funding cycle.Trainings that generate income to the applicant.Routine or well-established technologies.

Through WaterSMART, the Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) leverages Federal and non-Federal funding to work cooperatively with States, Tribes, and local entities as they plan for and implement actions to increase water supply sustainability through investments in existing infrastructure and attention to local water conflicts. WaterSMART provides support for priorities identified in Presidential Executive Order 14008: Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad (E.O. 14008) and aligned with other priorities, such as those identified in Presidential Executive Order 13985: Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government (E.O. 13985). The WaterSMART Small-Scale Water Efficiency Projects also support the goals of the Interagency Drought Relief Working Group established in March 2021 and the National Drought Resiliency Partnership. These grants will advance the Biden-Harris Administration’s Justice40 Initiative. Established by E.O. 14008, the Justice40 Initiative has it made it a goal that 40 percent of the overall benefits of certain federal investments flow to disadvantaged communities. Federal agencies are using the Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool to help identify disadvantaged communities. The objective of this NOFO is to invite States, Indian Tribes, irrigation districts, water districts, and other organizations with water or power delivery authority to leverage their money and resources by cost sharing with Reclamation on small-scale on-the-ground projects that seek to conserve, better manage, or otherwise make more efficient use of water supplies. Proposed projects that are supported by an existing water management and conservation plan, System Optimization Review, or other planning effort led by the applicant are prioritized. This prioritization will help ensure that projects funded under this NOFO are well thought out, have public support, and have been identified as the best way to address water management concerns. Reclamation has simplified the evaluation criteria and streamlined the application process for this category of WaterSMART Grants to ensure that the process works for smaller entities. Simplified evaluation criteria are intended to provide each applicant with an opportunity to succinctly explain how the proposed project would meet a defined need identified through a prior planning effort.

Full-time Investees are nonprofits in our focus areas selected by our committee to receive a multiyear investment, capacity building tools, and Partnership expertise for 3-5 years to increase their organizational capacity and amplify their impact.