Elizabeth Seale, Interim Director
AmeriCorps State/National
Chief Operating Officer
Margaret Rosenberry, Director
Office of Grants Management
At the recent National Conference on Volunteering and Service and on a Conference call held on July 10, 2006, David Eisner spoke to many of you about the increasing emphasis on federal agencies to clearly demonstrate efficient utilization of funds. Congressional appropriators have raised concerns about the amounts of AmeriCorps unobligated funding carried over from year to year.
A significant portion of the annual AmeriCorps carryover is unrequested formula funding. Nearly $10 million of the formula allotment in 2004 and again in 2005 went unrequested. Under our current policy, funds that a commission does not request from its formula allotment are reserved for that commission to request in the following year, over and above its allotment for the current year. Funds not requested two years in a row may be realloted to other commissions that can use more than their base allotments. Thus, this year the Corporation will reallot unrequested 2005 formula funds that commissions do not request in 2006.
On the July 10TH conference call, David also asked States who do not request their entire 2006 formula allotment to voluntarily release most or all of the unrequested amount so that we can reallot those funds instead of reserving them for use in 2007. In this way, we can improve the utilization of funds by granting almost all formula funding monies in the year in which they are appropriated.
Reallotment of Unrequested Formula Funding
This year, the Corporation will reallot unrequested 2005 reserve formula funds and voluntarily released formula funds from the 2006 allotments that commissions do not request. States that can use these funds may request them, but to qualify for additional formula funding, you must:
- request your full base allotment of formula funding and all of your 2005 reserve,
- demonstrate the capacity to effectively utilize the additional formula funds through grants to local programs (programs should be already identified or identified within three months of your request), and
- be free of outstanding compliance or audit issues that would preclude an award of additional formula funds.
The Corporation will reallot available funds to commissions that meet these qualifications using our standard population-based formula.
You must submit your request for additional formula funds via e-mail to your program officer and grants officer no later than August 1, 2006. Your e-mail should include the amount of funding and number of MSYs you are requesting, and the specific programs that you intend to fund. If you cannot identify the specific programs that you intend to fund by August 1st, you must include a plan for how the funds will be disseminated. Your plan must include a commitment to identify all programs in your state to receive the additional formula funding by October 31, 2006 and criteria to ensure that funds are disseminated to programs with strong capacity to fully use the additional resources.
After August 1st when the Corporation has determined the full amount of available funding for reallotment and commissions have submitted all requests for additional support, the Corporation will work with commissions to amend their formula awards to include the additional funding and MSYs.
Please remember that the additional funds and MSYs are granted for one year only. There is no guarantee that funds will be available for funding a second or third year and the Corporation’s grant will indicate the programs are only funded for one year. Therefore, we caution you in requesting additional funding and MSYs to take into consideration the long-term sustainability of the programs and service provided by the members.