Healthy Watersheds Consortium Grant Program

To support strategically protecting healthy watersheds across the country. The focus of the grant program is to protect freshwater, estuarine, and marine ecosystems and their watersheds. Additional background information on the Healthy Watersheds Pro

To strategically protect healthy watersheds across the country. The focus of the grant program is to protect freshwater, estuarine, and marine ecosystems and their watersheds. Additional background information on the Healthy Watersheds Program and priorities can be found at the following website: https://www.epa.gov/hwp

Universities, colleges and institutions of higher education and hospitals are not eligible under this announcement. Non-profit, non-governmental organizations, interstate agencies, and intertribal consortia are eligible to compete in this program. The term "interstate agency" is defined in CWA Section 502 as "an agency of two or more States established by or pursuant to an agreement or compact approved by the Congress, or any other agency of two or more States, having substantial powers or duties pertaining to the control of pollution as determined and approved by the Administrator." Intertribal consortia must meet the requirements of 40 CFR Part 35.504. For certain competitive funding opportunities under this assistance listing, the Agency may limit eligibility to compete to a number or subset of eligible applicants consistent with the Agency's Assistance Agreement Competition Policy.

Public and private nonprofit institutions/organizations, federally recognized Indian tribal governments, states, local governments, U.S. territories and interstate agencies.

Non-profit applicants may be asked to provide documentation that they meet the definition of a non-profit organization. Interstate organizations may be asked to provide a citation to the statutory authority, which establishes their status. Intertribal consortia may be asked to provide documentation that they meet the requirements of 40 CFR Part 35.504.

The Healthy Watershed Consortium Grant Program funds one cooperative agreement to an organization to manage the Healthy Watershed Consortium Grant subaward process that will award subgrants to support the strategic protection of freshwater, estuarine, and marine ecosystems and their watersheds across the country. These funds are used for healthy watershed capacity development and for local demonstration and/or training projects. Projects funded under the subgrant process must be limited to activities that conduct or promote the coordination and acceleration of research, investigations, experiments, training, demonstrations, surveys, and studies relating to the causes, effects, extent, prevention, reduction, and elimination of water pollution. Specific uses and restrictions on funds will be described in detail in the competitive announcements. Grants and cooperative agreements are available to support recipients' allowable direct costs in approved scopes of work plus allowable indirect costs, in accordance with established EPA policies and regulations. Funding awarded for research does not include research within the purview of EPA's Office of Research and Development. Healthy Watersheds Consortium Grant funds cannot be used for the purchase of land or conservation easements. Assistance agreement awards under this program may involve or relate to geospatial information. Further information regarding geospatial information may be obtained by viewing the following website: Geospatial Resources at EPA (https://www.epa.gov/geospatial).

The terms of the grant shall be determined at time of grant award.

This program is eligible for coverage under E.O. 12372, "Intergovernmental Review of Federal Programs." EPA financial assistance programs and activities subject to intergovernmental review that are subject to review under State single point of contact procedures are identified at https://www.epa.gov/grants/epa-financial-assistance-programs-subject-executive-order-12372-and-section-204. Applicants for programs or activities subject to Intergovernmental Review that are not subject to State single point of contact review must provide directly affected State, areawide, regional, and local entities at least 60 days to review their application following notification by EPA that the application has been selected for funding as provided by 40 CFR 29.8(a) and (c). EPA awards grants and cooperative agreements based on the competitive applications submitted in response to EPA solicitations, considering relevance and likelihood of the success of the projects. The standard application forms, as furnished by the Federal agency and required by 2 CFR 200 and 1500 as applicable, must be used for this program. Regarding pre-application assistance with respect to competitive funding opportunities under this assistance listing, EPA will generally specify the nature of the pre-application assistance, if any, that will be available to applicants in the competitive announcement. For additional information, contact the individual(s) listed in the competitive announcement.

Applicants, except in limited circumstances approved by the Agency, must submit all initial applications for funding through Grants.gov.

The evaluation and selection criteria for competitive awards under this assistance listing description will be described in the competitive announcement.

For competitive awards, EPA will review and evaluate applications in accordance with the terms, conditions, and criteria stated in the competitive announcement. Competitions will be conducted in accordance with EPA policies/regulations for competing assistance agreements.

For competitive awards, deadlines will be specified in the competitive announcement.

Grants are usually awarded within 4 months of receipt of completed application.

Assistance agreement competition-related disputes will be resolved in accordance with the dispute resolution procedures published in 70 FR (Federal Register) 3629, 3630 (January 26, 2005). Copies of these procedures may also be found at: https://www.epa.gov/grants/grant-competition-dispute-resolution-procedures.