Empower Tehama

Empower Tehama, a tax-exempt nonprofit organization based in Red Bluff, California, operates as a federal grant recipient (38% of recent awards) and sub-recipient (62%) delivering transitional housing, emergency shelter, and victim support services to survivors of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, stalking, and child abuse across rural northern California. The organization does not hold prime federal contracts and competes primarily under federal victim-services and homelessness-prevention grant programs rather than procurement vehicles.

Empower Tehama's federal funding footprint centers on four agencies. The Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs' Office for Victims of Crime accounts for 18 awards; the Department of Housing and Urban Development's Assistant Secretary for Community Planning and Development accounts for 13 awards; the Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Children and Families accounts for 6 awards; and the Department of Justice's Office on Violence Against Women accounts for 3 awards. These four customers represent 95% of Empower Tehama's recent award count across a portfolio of 42 total awards (prime and sub combined, all sources) obligating $8.6 million. The organization works primarily as a sub-recipient flowing federal funds through California's Office of Emergency Services as the prime grantee; sub-recipient work under OES spans child advocacy centers, transitional housing for crime victims, domestic violence emergency shelter, psychotherapy services for child abuse victims, and sexual assault support services.

As a prime grant recipient, Empower Tehama holds recurring Continuum of Care (CoC) program awards from HUD's Office of Community Planning and Development — awards issued annually or biannually from November 2021 through March 2026, with awards completing on annual twelve-month cycles. The organization is also prime recipient on a $500,000 Department of Justice Office on Violence Against Women Transitional Housing Assistance Grants for Victims of Domestic Violence, Dating Violence, Stalking, or Sexual Assault award (CFDA 16.736) running from October 1, 2024 through September 30, 2027, and holds a Department of Justice Office on Violence Against Women Rural Domestic Violence, Dating Violence, Sexual Assault, and Stalking Program award (CFDA 16.589) with a three-year performance period running from October 1, 2022 through September 30, 2025. Prime work emphasizes program-owned clustered and privately owned scattered-site residences, case management, childcare, career counseling, rental assistance, and employment training designed to move survivors into permanent housing and economic self-sufficiency.

Award activity shows moderate volume — eight awards in 2023, twelve in 2024, and eight in 2025 — with only one award scheduled to complete in the next twenty-four months and therefore facing recompete pressure. Empower Tehama's recent sub-recipient awards flow through the Office of Emergency Services and carry completion dates ranging from September 2024 through January 2026, supporting child advocacy centers, victim housing assistance, domestic violence shelter operations, and trauma-informed psychotherapy services. The organization partners with Tehama County Job Training Center and the Poor and the Homeless Tehama County Coalition to deliver these services in a rural region with limited victim-services infrastructure.