December 2022 and January 2023 Resources
Each month LOR sends a curated list of funding opportunities and other resources relevant for small rural communities in the Mountain West. To receive a link to our monthly resources guide, drop us a line to connect@lorfoundation.org.
Funding Opportunities
DECEMBER DEADLINES
WITH Foundation provides grants, usually between $30,000 and $50,000, to nonprofits that support adults with developmental disabilities. Funding can be used to provide education and training for health practitioners, to make improvements to payment systems, and support advocacy for decision-making for adults with a developmental disability.
Open: Now
Deadline: Letters of interest are due Dec. 9. Selected applicants must submit by January 30.
The Air & Space Forces Association’s Educator Grants give $500 to 40 educators to support aerospace education activities in U.S. classrooms from kindergarten through 12th grade. Educators’ proposals may include—but are not limited to—classroom science or technology demonstration kits, classroom science supplies, science and technology software for K-12 use, science manipulatives, supplies for making flying objects, and supplies for robotics programs.
Open: Now
Deadline: Dec. 15
The National Park Service is accepting grant proposals for $25,000 to $750,000 under the “Save America’s Treasures Collection Grants” program to help local governments, tribes, and nonprofits preserve nationally significant historic properties and collections. Eligible properties include historic districts, buildings, sites, structures; eligible objects and collections include artifacts, museum collections, documents, sculptures, and other works of art. The program funds a wide array of preservation activities, but does not support construction of new buildings, acquisition of sites, or long-term maintenance beyond the grant period.
Open: Now
Deadline: Dec. 20
Funding is available to nonprofits and state, local, and tribal governments to provide legal services for homeless veterans and veterans at-risk for homelessness. The goal of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ new Legal Services for Homeless Veterans and Veterans At-Risk for Homelessness Grant Program is to provide grants up to $150,000 to organizations that can assist homeless and at-risk veterans who need legal services to attain housing stability.
Open: Now
Deadline: Dec. 30
The Walmart Foundation’s Local Community Grants program provides awards between $250 and $5,000 to nonprofits, local governments, and schools to support a wide variety of initiatives that improve quality of life. Eligible projects can be proposed in the areas of community and economic development, diversity and inclusion, education, environmental sustainability, health and human services, hunger relief and healthy eating, public safety, or recreation, arts, or cultural experiences.
Open: Now
Deadline: Dec. 31
JANUARY DEADLINES
The Nora Roberts Foundation provides general operating grants of $3,000 to $6,000 to nonprofits that provide literacy services directly to adults. The program is administered by ProLiteracy via its Literacy Opportunity Fund and aims to meet the needs of a variety of adult literacy programs throughout the country.
Open: Now
Deadline: Jan. 3
The JAMS Foundation/ACR Initiative for Students and Youth provides funding for up to $40,000 for conflict prevention and dispute resolution programs for pre-K-12 students and for adults working with youth populations. The goal of this funding initiative is to support conflict resolution education and training for children ages 5 to 11 years old to cope with crisis, stress, and lack of hope in the future. Funding ranging from $20,000 to $40,000 is available to nonprofits, educational institutions, and public agencies that are focused on conflict resolution education and training.
Open: Now
Deadline: Jan. 9
Grants from the Federal Communications Commission are available to help increase participation in the broadband Affordable Connectivity Program. The Affordable Connectivity Program is a service that helps families pay for broadband service and internet-connected devices. Local and tribal governments, nonprofits and for-profit organizations, and institutes of higher education can apply for up to $1,000,000 to implement an outreach program to help connect families in their communities to affordable broadband.
Open: Now
Deadline: Jan. 9
The Bob Woodruff Foundation provides grants to support nonprofits that provide direct services to the military and veteran community. Grants (no funding range provided) can be used to improve the overall health and well-being of service members, veterans, their families, and caregivers, including funding for programs that improve the social determinants of health, decrease barriers to accessing physical and mental healthcare, increase accessibility to programming that fosters a healthy lifestyle, and enhance opportunities for veterans to thrive after service. Applications are accepted year-round and awarded twice a year, in the spring and fall.
Open: Now
Deadline: Jan. 12
The National Endowment for the Humanities’ Cultural and Community Resilience program supports community-based efforts to preserve local cultural resources and heritage. Nonprofits and local and tribal governments are eligible for funding up to $150,000 to digitally capture historical resources, safeguard cultural resources, collect oral histories, and document traditional knowledge. The program recognizes the importance of documenting contemporary experiences with climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic and of deepening our understanding of their impacts on people and communities.
Open: Now
Deadline: Jan. 12
The National Endowment for the Humanities’ Preservation Assistance Grants for Smaller Institutions provides grants up to $10,000 to nonprofits and local or tribal governments to improve their ability to care for humanities collections. Libraries, museums, historical societies, cultural organizations, town and county records offices, and other small institutions that care for books, journals, manuscripts, prints, photographs, historical records, or digital materials are eligible for awards to support their preservation efforts.
Open: Now
Deadline: Jan. 12
The NEA Big Read, an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest, will provide grants between $5,000 and $20,000 to nonprofits and libraries to host community-wide reading programs. The Big Read is a reading program that is designed to bring communities together around a selected book title with a goal of broadening understanding of our world, our neighbors, and ourselves through a shared reading and discussion experience. Grantees must select a book from the current available reading selections, program diverse and imaginative events and activities related to the book selection, and engage with community partners.
Open: Now
Deadline: Jan. 18
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) Rural Communities Opioid Response – Overdose Response Program will provide grants of approximately $300,000 to 40 nonprofits, state, local, or tribal governments to address community-level needs related to the drug overdose crisis. This funding is targeted to rural communities and eligible activities include prevention, treatment, and recovery initiatives aimed at reducing the morbidity and mortality of substance use disorder, including opioid use disorder.
Open: Now
Deadline: Jan. 19
The U.S. Department of Agriculture is offering grants to support telemedicine and distance learning in rural communities with fewer than 20,000 residents. Distance Learning & Telemedicine grants of $50,000 to $1,000,000 help local and tribal governments, nonprofits, for-profits, and groups of these entities working in rural communities use telecommunications to connect residents with health and learning opportunities. Funding can be used to support equipment, hardware, software, instructional programing, technical assistance, and broadband purchases for distance learning or telemedicine.
Open: Now
Deadline: Jan. 30
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s HOPE VI Main Street Grant Program is designed to support local governments’ efforts to renovate historic or traditional central business districts or “Main Streets” by replacing unused, obsolete commercial space with affordable housing units. Funding, which can be up to $500,000 can be used to build new affordable housing or reconfigure obsolete or surplus commercial space (or extremely substandard, vacant housing) into affordable housing units.
Open: Now
Deadline: Jan. 31
The Banfield Foundation, through its Community Care Grants, provides funding and medical supplies to nonprofits and local governments that deliver veterinary care through on-site, mobile, or pop-up clinics. Applications are accepted quarterly in January, April, July, and October, and awards are announced the following month (no grant award range is provided).
Open: Now
Deadline: Jan. 31
The U.S. Department of Energy will begin accepting proposals for its Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program beginning in January. With total funding of $550 million available to support states’, local governments’, and tribes’ efforts to implement energy and emissions reduction strategies and to promote energy efficiency, localities should begin considering now what to include in their proposals. Funding can be used to support energy efficiency strategies, secure technical assistance, conduct energy audits, establish financial incentives for energy efficiency improvements, grants for retrofitting buildings, installation of technology that utilizes energy from solar, wind, biomass, or fuel cells, and a variety of other strategies that support energy efficiency initiatives.
Open: January 2023
Deadline: TBD, but will be announced in January 2023
The MLB-MLBPA Youth Development Foundation provides grants to increase participation in and expand access to youth baseball and softball programs. The foundation provides support in the following areas: capital projects, including field lighting, renovations, and construction; baseball and softball programs, including equipment for players, uniforms, training of coaches, umpire fees, player registration fees, facility rental fees, and field maintenance; education initiatives, including programs, exhibits, and other learning opportunities that use baseball and softball as the primary focus to promote interest and engagement in the game.
Open: Now
Deadline: Rolling
The LOR Foundation’s new Field Work initiative provides funding for research into innovative approaches to using water in agriculture. Farmers and ranchers in rural parts of Colorado, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, and Wyoming are eligible for up to $10,000 to implement innovative water projects in the face of unprecedented drought. Potential projects might include new ideas for water or land-use practices, products, or technologies that change the way water is used on a farm or ranch. The hope is that this real-world research will reveal solutions that can be used throughout the West to grow food while contending with water supply challenges. Feel free to connect with Bill Jaeger, LOR’s strategic initiatives officer, to learn more: bill@lorfoundation.org or 720-501-7322.
Open: February 1
Deadline: February 22
Other Resources
The U.S. Department of Transportation is accepting requests for technical assistance from local communities that want to access Bipartisan Infrastructure Law funding for local transportation projects. The Thriving Communities Program was created to help ensure small communities can access the technical tools and capacity to compete for federal funding for infrastructure projects. THe program is seeking Letters of Interest from communities to share their transportation goals and vision in exchange for possibly winning support from a team of transportation experts and support staff paid for by USDOT along with the ability to hire local community firms to help with the work for two years.
Open: Now
Deadline: Dec. 6
The Federal Communications Commission recently released an initial draft of a national map showing in greater detail than ever before what locations in the country have broadband service. These draft maps can help local communities identify and plan for outreach efforts. Communities can also use the data to inform infrastructure grant proposals as funding for broadband expansion continues to roll out in the year ahead.
The USDA and the U.S. Forest Service recently released a Wildfire Risk and Planning tool to help communities understand and plan ahead. This tool can help local communities understand risks and identify ways to take action to address wildfire threats.
The Government Finance Officer Association has made it easy to track the notices of funding on its infrastructure-specific Notice of Funding Opportunity Tracker page. Federal infrastructure funding is expansive in its reach, addressing energy and power infrastructure, access to broadband internet, water infrastructure, and more. This tool helps local communities track upcoming funding opportunities and to plan ahead for projects that could benefit from federal funding.
Talking about serious illness and dying in America can be challenging. Which is precisely why the John A. Hartford and Cambria Health foundations leaned on McCabe Message partners and Constructive.co to build this elegant, simple, and down-to-earth tool kit for talking about serious illness.
On Dec. 7, Rural Lead’s Learning Initiative is hosting virtual peer learning sessions aimed at building connections among rural and Indigenous leadership development practitioners, and providing ideas and resources to utilize in capacity building efforts. The 90-minute sessions are a mix of facilitated learning and peer discussion and participants can view prior sessions they may have missed.