Transcript_8-5-2020_Informational Conference Call_LRSP.pdf

Lifespan Respite Care Program Special Projects to Strengthen Program Development, Implementation and Sustainability

HHS-2020-ACL-AOA-LRSP-0432

Moderator: Greg Link August 5, 2020 – 12:30 PM ET

Coordinator:

As a reminder, today's call is being recorded. If you have any objections you may disconnect at this time. Thank you.

Greg Link: Thank you and good afternoon everyone. This is Greg Link. I'm the Director of the Office of Supportive and Caregiver Services at the Administration for

Community Living. Welcome to this information call for the funding opportunity entitled A Lifespan Respite Care Program -- Special Projects to

Strengthen Program Development Implementation and Sustainability.

This call is an opportunity for ACL grants and program staff to run through with listeners the requirements that are laid out in the funding opportunity announcement. Then, we will be opening the lines for questions from anyone who's interested in possibly applying to this funding opportunity announcement. I would ask again if folks could please mute their lines. That way we don't get any interference or echoes.

Joining me from ACL on this call is Lori Stalbaum. She's an Aging Services

Program Specialist in my office. Lori is the program officer for the Lifespan

Respite Care Program. And we also are joined by LaDeva Harris with ACL's

Office of Grants Management. LaDeva is a grants management specialist -- or that go-to expert within the agency for matters pertaining to budgets, drawing down of funds, and more or less the business activities associated with your grant project.

So this call is only going to be addressing this one particular funding opportunity announcement. And it really is intended as the one and only opportunity for folks to hear about the program from ACL staff as well as to ask questions.

So hopefully you all - I don't know who's on the call and hopefully we'll learn a bit more about that a little bit later. But hopefully those of you who are on the call have had an opportunity to read through the funding opportunity announcement and formulate your questions. It would be great if you had it open in front of you because what I'm going to do is walk through the funding opportunity section by section.

Please also note that a copy of the transcript of this call -- a printed copy of the transcript -- will be available in about a week or so after this call. It'll be available on the Grants.gov Web site in association with this (FOA). That way if you missed anything or you want to revisit any of the questions that were asked...

Man: My job is done here.

Greg Link: Hello? Hi, if you all could please mute your lines that would be great. A copy of this transcript will be available for folks to read through if you want to revisit any of the information that we cover.

So what I'm going to do now is if we could jump into the walking through the funding opportunity announcement. If you are open on the PDF -- If you go to the third page of the PDF which is actually page number one -- we provide just a few very summary bits of information at the very top. And you'll see three critical states that you all really need to be aware of related to this funding opportunity announcement.

The first is the due date for letters of intent. The due date for a letter of intent for this particular funding opportunity is August the 14th of 2020. Letters of intent are not required, but we really do like to have a letter of intent because it helps us in setting up the grant review process that will follow the submission of your application if we know approximately how many applications we're going to be receiving ahead of time. It enables us to be able to identify the right number of grant reviewers as well as hopefully eliminate upfront any conflicts of interest that might present themselves as a result of our grant reviewers.

So letters of intent again are not required but they are very, very helpful tools for us at ACL. And they are due on August the 14th. They do not have to be anything formal or extensive; it could simply be an e-mail to Lori Stalbaum saying, "Hey we intend to apply for this grant." But it doesn't have to be anything more than that. If your agency's policy is that it's a formal letter on letterhead, then by all means do what is required of you, but it does not have to be anything extensive.

The second critical date and probably the most important one is the due date for application and the due date for applications is September the 3rd 2020 by

11:59 p.m. on September the 3rd 2020. This date is set in stone. There will not be any extension of due dates for this particular funding opportunity and so this date of 9-3-2020 is a hard and fast date. So please, as you're beginning to write your application writing process, please be mindful of that because as we get into a little bit of what you need to do to submit your application you're probably going to want to be in a position to submit your application a couple of days before this just to make sure that there are no glitches with the grant submission system or anything else. So we'll cover that in a bit more in just a minute.

And then of course the other date is today which is our information conference call. I'm glad you all are here.

Lori Stalbaum: I'd just like to interject two things.

Greg Link: Okay, please.

Lori Stalbaum: The deadline -- 11:59 p.m. -- that is Eastern Time. And the letter of intent, please note -- it states on the (FOA) -- but submitting a letter of intent does not obligate you to apply. It does, as Greg said, just help us make sure we have adequate number of grant reviewers for the potential number of applications.

So it does not commit you to anything; it just helps us out immensely. Thank you.

Greg Link: Thanks. So if we look on, again, on page one of the funding opportunity announcement -- it's actually Page 3 of the PDF we have the executive summary -- where we just site the statutory authority for this funding opportunity announcement which is Section 2903 as the Lifespan Respite

Care Act. And the special projects that we are looking to fund with this particular announcement will complement the work of the recently funded

Lifespan Respite Technical and Assistance Resource Center or TARC that was funded just recently in FY2020.

Additionally, this work is also going to be somewhat forward looking in that it will attempt to address some of the rest of the considerations that are currently going on and that will need to be addressed by the Family Caregiving

Advisory Council that was established under the Recognize Assist and Form

Support and Engage or RASE Family Caregivers ACT in addition to a couple of other focus areas that I will get to in just a minute. But the primary legislative authority for this (FOA) is the Lifespan Respite Care Act of 2006.

The special projects that are identified in this (FOA) are expected to concentrate on strengthening the underpinnings of Lifespan Respite Care

Program development implementation and sustainability in three - in several broad areas. We are looking to develop and test respite workforce recruitment training and retention programs to better meet the respite needs of family caregivers, and in particularly in light of the COVID-19 pandemic and the impact that that has had on the workforce.

We are also looking to develop and test and field test a state-based framework and roadmap for respite system planning and development. And this is the portion that will tie to the work of the Family Caregiving Advisory Council and the forthcoming National Caregiving Strategy which is currently under development. We are also looking to strengthen and test enhanced approaches to help caregivers and families develop or strengthen their own systems of national supports to include respite and other similar types of support.

And then we understand that, you know, we certainly don't know the full breadth of everything that's needed out there. We are giving the opportunity for applicants to identify other areas of expanded technical assistance and capacity building that would work to improve state-based respite capacities as you and your partners might identify.

We also provide -- in the executive summary -- a definition of what we mean by lifespan respite care programs. And this is critical because it's sort of the underpinning of all of the work here. We understand that Lifespan Respite

Care Programs are coordinated systems of accessible community-based respite care services for family caregivers of children or adults of all ages with special needs. And this is one of the critical aspects of this work.

We -- ACL -- does intend for and we are looking for projects that are lifespan in their approach, so it does not exclusively target one age group over another but it is truly life lifespan from zero to death. And it looks to provide work in areas that support individuals of all types with all types of special needs --children of people of any age with any type of special needs and the family caregivers to support them.

Under this funding opportunity announcement, ACL plans to award one cooperative agreement. And we fully anticipate that the application that is submitted and the project that is funded will reflect a collaborative approach among a consortium of organizations working in a well-defined partnership with one entity acting as a fiduciary and programmatic lead.

In the vein of a cooperative agreement, the successful applicant -- the entity that is funded along with their partners -- should expect considerable and substantial involvement of the ACL federal program officer for the Lifespan

Respite Care Program -- that's Lori Stalbaum -- in all aspects of the program's design and implementation of the activities that are outlined a little bit lower in the (FOA).

You know, we are expecting and we'll be looking for applicants and their collaborating partners to possess direct in-house experience and expertise and must demonstrate to support and active involvement of a range of stakeholders. And we'll touch a little bit more on that in just a second.

There is a match requirement for this funding opportunity. That match is stipulated in statute. Any funds that are awarded under the Lifespan Respite

Care Program Authority grantees are required to meet a 25% match in those matching funds or the match can be made up of both non-federal cash and in-kind resources, and I'll touch base on that in just a minute.

If you go to the bottom of Page 4 of the entire document or Page number 2, we have the background and purpose. And here, we just lay out a little bit of history about the Lifespan Respite Care Program. The program was authorized some 14 years ago. ACL has been implementing it since 2009. We have funded, you know, many states to implement Lifespan Respite Care

Program and we've also supported technical assistance activities since we began program implementation in 2009.

And we really see this opportunity -- through this funding opportunity -- to dig a little deeper into some of the critical issues that we have identified over the years in terms of really helping states to build a comprehensive and well-structured Lifespan Respite Care system.

We just, as I mentioned earlier, we just awarded a new five year cooperative agreement for the Technical Assistance Resource Center for Lifespan Respite

Care Programs. And we expect this project to work very closely hand-in-hand with that newly funded Technical Assistance Resource Center.

The Resource Center that was just funded will be working to advance the research respite agenda. We'll be providing very targeted one-on-one grantee and state specific program development implementation and technical assistance. And they're going to work very broadly on national capacity building at the federal, state, and local levels. And so the activities under this particular funding opportunity announcement are expected to coordinate and complement those activities.

A little further down on Page 5 or actual Page 3 of the document, we have activities and desired outcomes. And we have targeted three main areas that we want applicants to consider -- to focus on -- focus their work on over the course of three years. One is workforce development.

The second is the state-based respite planning, and this really is in light of the fact that we are going to be having a national caregiving strategy being released in the future hopefully sometime next year. And a large part of that strategy is expected to focus on respite programs and respite supports for family caregivers. States need to be ready to meet those challenges and to begin thinking about how they are going to better address the respite needs of family caregivers. And so we're looking for one of the primary focus areas to be how you all would propose supporting states in some state-based respite planning.

The workforce element of this is really critical. You know, we cited some statistics here in the (FOA). But ACL believes that we see a pressing need for a larger and stronger workforce to provide respite that's comprised of both paid and unpaid providers due to the growing need for family caregiver assistance. So we would be looking at proposals that the proposals may want to look at recruitment, retention, recognition, and training standards to better serve to better address the current barriers with providing respite to more families in need.

The third area that this (FOA) is addressing is around the whole concept of natural supports. In recent years, ACL efforts to support families have focused on helping individual families identify those catalysts and infrastructures and innovations that will lead to better outcomes for support whatever their circumstances, and to remain in the community and maintain caregiving capacity.

You know, given the current challenges with the workforce that we also hope to address as well as the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, ACL is interested in further developing this whole area of natural -- of enabling families to develop their own natural supports in a more robust and sustainable manner.

And then as I've also mentioned earlier, we recognize that these three areas are important, but you as prospective applicants who are looking to do some work in this area, you know, we recognize that there may be other things that you identify as really critical need. And you're free to propose additional efforts in addition to the three that are outlined above.

My suggestion would be to focus first on all three. The strong applications will include a very well developed focus on all three of those areas outlined above. And then as your time and resources permit and your bandwidth to do additional work, you may look at adding on some additional areas of focus as you identify and may be appropriate.

Proposals that you submit will be evaluated on the extent to which they are grounded and documented gaps and identified opportunities to further expand national efforts. And applicants should consider and propose a variety of approaches which we have laid out on Page 4 of the (FOA) which would, you know, developing and testing, you know, workforce recruitment, training and retention programs, developing and field testing a state based framework and roadmap for respite system planning, and then enhancing approaches to help caregivers and families develop or strengthen their own natural support system. And we lay out some things for you to consider as you think about how you might design these approaches.

In addition to the three required focus areas as well as some of the optional work which you may choose to do, applicants, there are some additional considerations that you need to be aware of as you're preparing your applications and that starts at the bottom of Page number 4. How you prioritize project activities and target audiences is going to be critical.

There's a potential for a lot of work to be accomplished over the course of this grant. We also recognize that, you know, it may not be a linear process that you choose to work on things; it may be that you choose, you know, to work on the workforce piece first maybe followed by natural supports, and then the respite state-based framework. It may be some order of those. Applications will be evaluated on the extent to which their approach for addressing each of these areas is cohesive in that it makes sense.

You also may need to order, you know, may wish to order and focus your activities based on the current environment that's out there. We do expect that all work and products will be made available to all states and communities who are interested in expanding the respite and family support activities as they relate to the focus areas. And as I said, this project will be expected to closely align and work with the newly-funded Lifespan Respite Technical

Assistance Center.

I've mentioned a couple of things now about collaboration and partnerships. If you look at the top of Page 5, we fully expect that given the breadth of what this (FOA) could cover that no one single organization could completely address it. And so we anticipate a (unintelligible) that the strongest applications will be those that reflect efforts of a partnership of organizations representing a lifespan approach to the desired activities.

And as I've also mentioned, one organization is expected to be the documented programmatic and fiscal lead with other partner organizations very clearly defined -- their roles very clearly defined -- throughout the application materials. And so by that in the project narrative, in the budget that you'll be submitting and in the work plan that you'll be submitting, and we'll touch base on that in just a second.

We also mentioned the possibility of a steering committee. In many of the grants that ACL funds of this type where we are looking at capacity building, broad technical assistance and things like that, steering committees can be an effective method of ensuring that many diverse ideas are considered and in the planning and implementation of the new project. And so, you know, if you are considering in your project having a steering committee, you should explain how you're going to identify the members of the steering committee or maybe who they already are, how they would function and support the work that you're doing. This will all be critical.

Another key area to be aware of is subgrants or contracts. We do permit, we do allow for funding of sub grantees or subcontracts to carry out specific activities as we believe, you know, that a project like this -- particularly of its scope and complexity -- will have a greater likelihood of success when a range of organizations undertake the work. And so you should very clearly in your application describe how the rationale and the criteria for selecting subgrantees or subcontractors including how you're going to monitor their work and progress and ensure that they are completing the tasks as they have been outlined in the project. But again, subgrants and subcontracts are oftentimes very useful tools.

That is sort of the basic overview of the funding opportunity itself. I want to talk just for a minute about the award information which begins on Page 6 of the (FOA). It's Section 2 -- Award Information. As I said, the funding instrument type is a cooperative agreement which implies substantial involvement from ACL in the work of the project. We anticipate a total of awarding one single cooperative agreement with an estimated total funding of up to $750,000.

This is a 36-month project with a 36-month budget period. What that means is we call these forward-funded meaning that the grantee will receive their award in full, upfront, at the beginning of the project, and then you have three years to complete your work. We use this approach in a number of situations where we believe that the stability of the funding is necessary in order to ensure that we can complete longer range of tasks. And we've used this approach, for example, in many of our ADRC grants and things of the like.

The project will be funded at a federal share of up to $750,000 for a period of three years, and no additional funding will be forthcoming from the federal government in subsequent years.

As I said, this is a cooperative agreement and we lay out the terms of the cooperative agreements on Page 7 of the funding opportunity announcement.

We lay out the tasks and activities that the ACL/AoA project officer will carry out, and then those activities that we expect the grantee to execute as part of the cooperative agreement, and these will all be incorporated by reference in you notice of award. So this will be -- this list of cooperative agreement tasks and activities -- is where you will find that so you should be very familiar with that.

We also expect, and we'll talk a little bit more about this, is that as part of the application you'll submit a three-year work plan that details the expectations of the major activities and products over the life of the project. And it will -also should include a detailed timeline of tangible milestones consistent with the terms and conditions of the notice of award. And so the project officer will work with the successful grantee to make sure that the work plan that's submitted is clear and is, you know, organized in such a way that it yields the results the ACL is looking to achieve.

If you go down to the Eligibility Information at the bottom of Page 7, we lay out - this is an open competition so it's open to domestic, public or private non-profit entities including state and local governments, Indian tribal governments and organizations. Those are who the eligible applicants are so it is a full and open competition.

At the top of Page 8, we lay out the cost sharing and how to calculate your match. As I said, there is a 25% match requirement for this project. Match can be made up of both non-federal cash and in-kind sources. And we provide you with just some examples of, you know, the types of sources of funding that can be used as match.

We then have responsiveness criteria, and we are now on Page 8 in Subsection

3. There are two responses in this criteria that every application we receive will be looked at before they move on to the review stage. Is the applicant -the first response in this criteria is the applicant an eligible applicant as defined in Section 3.1 above. That's going to be the first thing that we look at.

The second responsiveness criteria will be the degree whether or not the activities that are proposed in each application are national in scope and not limited to state and local efforts. This is going to be absolutely critical. We are looking -- ACL is looking -- for projects that work on a national scope; not just in one state or one community. So this will be absolutely critical. If the application does not reflect a national approach, the application will be screened out and will not be given consideration. So please make sure that your projects are of a national scope.

In addition to the responsiveness criteria, each application that we receive goes through a series of more technical screening, and that's laid out at the bottom of Page 8. And here it's very technical things. Was the application received on time? Is the project narrative of the correct length? Is a double spaced? Is it the correct font? All of that -- this is all critical.

The Project Narratives must not exceed 50 pages. And we've actually upped the limit for project narratives for this particular funding opportunity. Most times are page limits are 20, but we understand that given the complexity of what we're looking for to adequately do justice to your narrative, you're going to need more space to do that. And so there is a 50-page limit for project narratives.

Project narratives do not include the work plan, letters of commitment, or the

(Vita) of key project personnel. So those things are in addition but the project narrative is limited to 50 pages. Please note that if you if your narrative runs more than 50 pages, the reviewers will only get the first 50 pages of the narrative. So please be sure to stick within those page limits.

There is the whole section -- Section 4 -- on application and submission information. This is how - this provides you with detailed links and instructions for how to register with grants.gov. And if you have not registered with grants.gov, please start that process when this call ends.

It's absolutely critical that you are able to access grants.gov and submit your applications via the grants.gov Web site. We will not accept e-mails or mail-in applications. And it's very, very smart to start your application submission process well ahead of the deadline that's listed in the Funding Opportunity

Announcement.

There is a phone number if you need assistance with navigating and accessing the grants.gov Web site. Please note that the grants.gov Web site is not an

ACL Web site. So, if you have problems or need technical assistance with it, call the 800 number that is in this FOA. Do not call Lori, or LaDeva, or myself because we can't - we don't have access to the system in a way. We don't have access to the system and cannot provide you with technical support.

So, to save time, just call the 800 number to send the FOA if you need technical assistance with the grants.gov Web site.

All applicants must have a DUNS number, as well as be registered with the

System for Award Management, or SAM system. Links for those two sites are also included. Again, if you haven't registered for either a SAM or a

DUNS number, please begin that process immediately as well because oftentimes they can take - it can take a bit of time for that registration to take place.

And then on page - on Pages 9, 10, down to the bottom of Page 10, we provide you with all of the information that you need to know as far as what to submit, how to submit it in relevant links if you have questions.

We provide contact information; Lori Stalbaum’s email and phone number is at the very bottom of Page 10. If you have technical questions about anything, you know, related to the application process or what have you, you can reach out to (Lori) either by phone -- email is preferred -- it's generally more direct and then we have a written record of the types of communications and questions that we were receiving, so emails are always preferred.

At the very top of Page 11, we again talked about the Letter of Intent. Again, it's optional, but if - but they're very helpful and they are due on August the

14th.

About midway down on Page 11, through the bottom of page, let's see, about the bottom or the middle of Page 14, we layout the project narrative and what

ACL's expectations are for the project narrative. Please make sure that when you are developing your project narrative - which again, you have up to 50 pages of space to work in - please be sure that you include and that you have sections that talk about each of the areas that we are looking for in the project narrative. So, a well-formed problem statement, measurable goals and objectives, a good description of your proposed interventions outcomes - and we're going to talk in a second about outcomes, how critical those are - project management, evaluation dissemination, and your organizational capacity.

Each of these - each of these topics should be a very visible and well-formed section of the project narrative, so please pay close attention to that part of the

Funding Opportunity Announcement.

We also expect applicants to submit a budget narrative in addition to the basic budget that is submitted through grants.gov. Your applications should also include a detailed budget narrative, and we provide a template for you to do that.

The same goes for a work plan. The work plan should be consistent with the project narrative that it really provides that timeline and that breakdown down for when things will be happening, how things will be happening, who will be doing certain activities and tasks. So, a work plan that covers all three years of the project should be submitted as well.

We also anticipate that Letters of Commitment from key participating organizations and agencies would be part of your application. It's always good to have those Letters of Commitment, should hopefully be individualized and not, you know, form letters and each - each agency and organization that submits a Letter of Commitment should provide sufficient detail for what their role or what their support will be.

Finally, at the bottom of Page 14, again, we - there's the phone call that we're on today and then some other general submission information. Please note the funding restrictions which are listed on Page 16 of the FOA, activities that are not fundable which are - include construction and major rehab of buildings, basic research, such as scientific or medical experience, and the continuation of existing projects without expansion or new innovative approaches. So, those are the restricted areas that we will not be funding, projects that have anything to do with those three types of activities.

We also have some restrictions on meals and what - and it's supposed to be -the grant funds cannot be used to provide meals, except in several circumstances, which we laid out as well in the Funding Opportunity

Announcement.

The other final critical part of this FOA that you should be aware of is at the very bottom of Page 16, and that's the Application Review information. This, we have laid out for you, the exact criteria by which each application will be reviewed and scored by a panel of three independent reviewers. And we really strongly encourage applicants to get to know each of these areas that are evaluated and the point values that are assigned to each.

Please be sure each one of the review criteria is laid out in the form of a "yes, no, closed-in" question. I would say, generally, if you have a completed application and you want to compare your application against these review criteria, if you can answer, "yes," to each of the questions, it's fairly certain that you have an application that is complete. It doesn't guarantee that it is -that it's fundable, but if you can say that you have adequately and clearly responded to the program for the priority areas that we've laid out or, for example, is the project justified in terms of what we already know the environment is that is - in which it's operating, if you can say "yes" to that, than it's more than likely addressed that in a way that an independent reviewer can also make that assessment.

Please note that when your grant - when your applications are being reviewed, the only thing the reviewers have is your application. And so, the extent to which your narratives are clear, concise, to the point, and inclusive of the desired program areas and priorities, reviewers will not come to you asking questions for clarification. So, make sure that your applications are tightly written and that your narratives are clear, that your budgets are clear, that the numbers add up, and that your work plans are reasonable and feasible and demonstrate the likelihood that your work will be complete - completed on time.

I would like to just mention ACL has a very heavy and strong focus on project outcomes for our grant program. Please be sure that when you are developing project outcomes that they are measurable and that they are outcomes and not outputs. Outputs are products or widgets. Outcomes are sort of what happens as a result of what will be the situation or the condition as a result of the activities, you know, a measurable increase in knowledge, or measurable decreases in caregiver stress, or measurable improvements in the overall health and well-being of caregivers as demonstrated by X, Y and Z factors.

Those are outcomes. Outputs are, you know, we will do three reports on this and we will do two webinars on that. Those are outputs and should not be confused with outcomes. So, please be very careful when you're designing your outcomes to make sure that they are measurable.

We provide a little bit of information in the middle of Page 19 on the Review and Selection Process. You know, an independent review panel of at least three individuals will evaluate your applications against the scoring criteria that we've laid out. Final award decisions are always at the discretion of the

ACL administrator, and the administrator is going to take into consideration the recommendations of the review panel, the reviews for programmatic and grants management compliance, to reasonable - reasonableness of costs, and things of that nature.

As far as the anticipated award announcement date, we will be announcing, definitely, you'll receive a Notice of Award before September 30, that you have to - we will be making the award sometime in September, but definitely before September 30, and the start date will be no later than September 30, 2020.

You'll receive an electronic notice of award via grant solutions, and then the rest of the funding opportunity announcement just lays out reporting requirements, agency contacts, and then towards the back, we provide the templates that you would need for your instructions, for completing your SF-

424, as well as templates that you can use to set up your budget narratives as well as your work plans.

So, Lori, did you have anything you wanted to add to this, or LaDeva, before we open it for questions?

Lori Stalbaum: This is Lori. I have nothing to add at this point, but LaDeva, I believe, is going to give a little more information about budget narrative justification formats since it's covering a three-year period and we are anticipating a lot of partnerships which can sometimes make it a little bit more confusing to complete. Is that correct, LaDeva?

LaDeva Harris: Yes, I can go over that as well. And I actually did have something I wanted to say before that. I just wanted to piggyback off Greg’s emphasis on the importance of getting your DUNS and your SAM registration together if you have not done so already. It typically is a process that can already take a while to complete. But with COVID-19, there is a backup form that needs to be in the process. Some people have submitted requests in July and it still has not solidified or finalized yet.

So, if you have not already registered on the SAM.gov Web site (before the end of December, please, if you are - even if you are just considering the possibility of applying for this, I would definitely suggest making sure that you start that process immediately to make sure that you do have it up-to-date and active when it's time to actually submit to grants.gov because, otherwise, the grants.gov system is not going to allow your application to go through.

And as Greg said, the applications do have to be submitted via grants.gov.

They are not able to come to us.

And, of course, if you don't have that done, that you do want to make sure that if you are considering applying, that you get a jump on that as soon as possible. You know, even at the end of this of call, if you want to just start checking into that, as (Lori) mentioned), and sort of (unintelligible), this is going to be a three-year forward funded application.

So, though you're only going to have one (benefit) that will be for the three-year budget period, we do need 3 years’ worth of budgeting to show how you're (planning) on allocating the funds throughout the (funding) period, we do want to make sure that your SF-424 (best be) for the total amount you're requesting for the three-year (unintelligible) and that the project period and budget period on the 424 do align for the 36-month period which we can assume the September 30 start date of September 30 of 2020, with the end date of August 31 of 2020.

In the event that it starts on a different date prior to that, then we can make the adjustments in the system that you want to put in the default right now for the anticipation. The anticipated start date should be September 30 of 2020, ending August 31 of 2023. And, again, that can be entered into (Item Number

17) on your SF-424.

And then the...

Lori Stalbaum: And that would be September 29, the end date?

LaDeva Harris: ...you are correct, sorry about that, September the 29th of 2023 is what the...

((Crosstalk))

Lori Stalbaum: (Sorry.)

LaDeva Harris: No, thank you - thank you for listening, should be September the 29th, sorry about that. And then for Item Number 18 on the 424, the estimated funding should be the amount that you are requesting for- for the actual award

(project) period, that you should be listing there, in that - in that section.

There will also - (and) (unintelligible) (budget and a review) also requesting

SF-424A, and that 424A should be completed. Section (D) of your 424A is what should be completed. You don't need to worry about Section (E), which normally requests for (future) funding because this again is going to be forward-funded, so you won't need to be requesting (continuation) funding.

So, you just want to make sure that Section (D) is completed on your 424A and Section (B) if you want to break out the columns on (Section B) to outline

- to actually outline each year you can do that.

So, within Section (B), if you wanted to do Section (B), Column Number 1 can be for year one, two can be for year two, and three could be for year three, you can do it that way. Advise just to show how you're planning on allocating the funding, that your Notice of Award will actually (unintelligible) for the

(cumulative) amount that will be awarded for the entire amount of funds.

And then with your budget narrative, as Lori was mentioning, in addition to that 424A, we are going to need a narrative. You can still submit one cumulative one. But if you could also just outline how you're planning on doing the budget on an annual basis throughout the project period so that it does align with the - with what you're going to submit in your program narrative, that would also be greatly appreciated that way.

And then in the (non-federal) share, there is a (25%) requirement for the non-federal share. The easiest way to calculate that number, if you take the federal amount that you're requesting and divide it by three is the non-federal share. It should equate to one-third of the total project amount which includes the federal and non-federal funding.

Another thing to note as you're preparing your budget -- equipment. If you are going to be requesting equipment items, you just want to be mindful of the definition of equipment as it is listed in (2 CFR 200.3, and that will be any item that is in excess of, or equal to, or in excess of $5000 individually. So, if you are going to have 10 laptops that are $550 each, that is not going to qualify as equipment, it would have to be one item that has an actual per-unit cost associated with it of $5000 or more.

And that's really all I have for the budget portion, as well as the 424 and the

424A. We can open it up for questions. Anyone have anything else that they want me to (revisit) or anything that I left out specifically to ask, and I'll be glad to address.

Lori Stalbaum: Hi, this is Lori. I just was thinking about and I'd like to add one more thing before we go to Question and Answer. Talking about the - we have our three target areas in the Funding Opportunity Announcement. And, you know, as

Greg indicated, those should be your focal points. Those are the things that we're looking for. Those are the things that our review criteria, that the reviewers will use in the 100 point-scoring.

We'll be looking at - we've added the optional items because as Greg indicated, there are - we know there are more things, there may be time or natural byproduct of one piece of work that leads to another.

But I want to make clear that it is not ACL's expectation that anyone will add an optional task, to put it in there, because we know the applications will be coming from experts in the field. There will - there's no penalty for - if you choose to just stick with the three, that's what we're looking for. And there's no, like, bonus points if you add something. It was just a way for us to give you a little more depth and breadth in what you're writing.

But in - when we're informing the reviewers of how to check, about giving them a background meeting, we will be focusing on our three priority areas and let them know that there may or may not be an option, additional topics, and those are acceptable, but the focal point is the three main areas that we've identified.

You want to add anything to that, Greg?

Greg Link: No, that was excellent. Thank you, Lori, for that clarification.

Lori Stalbaum: So, I just would love to hear questions from folks.

Greg Link: Does anyone have questions, if you could please, if you have a question, please identify yourself before asking the question.

Lori Stalbaum: Don't forget to unmute.

Greg Link: Yes. Yes, and this is not moderated, so it's kind of a free-for-all, so you have just to start talking. No questions from anyone?

Lori Stalbaum: Well, then I have a question. This is Lori. For LaDeva, when I'm doing my budget narrative justification, I'm the applicant agency, so any of my - the staff that worked for me at my applicant agency would go - that are going to be paid for through my grant would go under the main heading of personnel in

(French). But the- my partners and my - that I may be - I'm going to contract with or they're going to be consultants, where would I put their costs? And are there limits to what people can ask - bill me for, you know, to (their) salaries and things? Would I put it under Other? Like, are they contractual?

How do I know where to - because I'm going to have - I'm going to be with working with, like, I don't know, you know, some organizations and some individuals, how do - where might those go?

LaDeva Harris: Okay. Thank you, Lori. So, you'll collect your direct staff that works for your agency (suggested) in the personnel section. Their salary and fringe benefits should be listed in the appropriate section of the budget category.

As far as for contractors, the different contractors, of course, that should go into Contractual. And that and the contracts are held - sorry, the contracts are held to the same principles which we would hold you to as the actual

(unintelligible), so you want to hold them to the same cost principles, which means that they would have the same salary limitations as well as the same, if you're taking (unintelligible) cost from them, all of that would be held to the same cost principles that we hold, that we hold you to, as actual

(unintelligible) that has the award with ACL.

As far as consultants are concerned, those can be entered into Other. They can also be entered into Contractual and we see them both ways. Again, for the consultants, you just want to make sure that they're being held to the same

(unintelligible) lines as well.

A lot of times for contractors, as well as consultants, it's billed at an hourly rate, so we do want to make sure that when you are submitting the hourly rate and estimating the amount of hours, if you can also include if there is an annual salary, make sure that you're including it as well so that we are making sure that they are not exceeding the annual salary limitations for individuals that are applying at this time as well. So, yes, we do want to just make sure that they are being held to those things, regulations, and all (also things) that we are holding you as the actual (branch leaders).

Lori Stalbaum: Thank you.

LaDeva Harris: You're welcome.

Greg Link: Any questions from folks that may be on the line?

LaDeva Harris: I'm sorry, I just want to make sure that I do reference that the current executive salary cap and limitation is $197,300, so that is the salary limitation currently in effect according to the existing executive order.

Lori Stalbaum: One hundred and ninety-seven thousand three hundred dollars per year before fringe benefits. This is Lori. Not counting fringe benefits, as I recall.

LaDeva Harris: Correct. That's been - that is the base salary and that does not include the fringe.

Lori Stalbaum: Thank you.

Greg Link: Any - any last call for questions before we end the call? Okay. Well, thank you all very much. We wish you good luck as you begin working on your applications and we look forward to seeing the submissions. So, with that, we will end the call. Thank you all very much.

Lori Stalbaum: Thank you so much for joining us. Goodbye, everyone.

Woman 1: Thank you.

LaDeva Harris: Bye. Thank you.

Woman 2: Bye. Thank you.