EECBG Grant Process (Text Version)
Below is a text version of the June 24, 2009 EECBG Grant Process presentation.
Charlie Hemmeline:
- Q&A box and if you type in a question there, we can see it and we'll tee it up and try to answer it as best we can. So this is Charlie Hemmeline here at DOE Headquarters. I'm joined by Johanna Zetterberg and Ralph Nine. Ralph is here from the National Energy Technology Lab and Lisa Kuzniar will also be joining us shortly to help answer questions related to the application process. So we've basically been focused on questions related to the process itself, but given that this is the day before, at this point we really want to answer any questions that you might have, so feel free to tee anything up that's up on your mind and we will try to get to it as best we can.
First Slide: EECBG Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) Information
Charlie Hemmeline:
So let me just jump in and kind of scroll through a few things real quickly here. We've made a few amendments to the original Funding Opportunity Announcement based on some policy changes that we've made since the initial inception. Hopefully, you've seen all that. If you've gone through the FedConnect site, you will have seen that and gotten the latest and greatest.
Next Slide: Registration Requirements
Charlie Hemmeline:
I want to take you through real quick just a couple of the key steps that you're gonna need, if you haven't already, to getting registered in order to apply. And for that, I'm gonna turn it over to my colleague, Johanna Zetterberg, to take you through that and a quick update we've just recently made.
Johanna Zetterberg:
Thanks, Charlie, and hi, everyone. This is Johanna Zetterberg from the Department of Energy. We do have one important update for you. An amendment was issued yesterday to the Funding Opportunity Announcement. It's pretty short and sweet but the basic message is that there's an alternate method available to you now to submit your application in the case that you are having trouble submitting through FedConnect. That alternate method is an email address which I will give you in a moment, but let me first say that we do prefer that you submit your application through FedConnect and if you are having issues there, we would please ask you to call the FedConnect support line, which is 1-800-899-6665. That's 1-800-899-6665. That will connect you directly to the FedConnect support line.
In the event that FedConnect cannot resolve your issue by the deadline, which is tomorrow, Thursday, June 25th at 8:00 p.m. eastern time exactly, you can submit your application to the following email address. Please get out your pens. It is eecbg@netl.doe.gov. So that's eecbg, as in Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant, @netl, which stands for the National Energy Technology Laboratory, netl.doe.gov, and please put in the subject line EECBG application followed by your unique identification code and information on your unique identification code is on Page 14 of the Funding Opportunity Announcement. Now it is important that you still register in FedConnect, get your DUNS number and your CCR number. You will need to do all of that to receive your award. So the announcement I'm making now is regarding just the submission of application.
We are posting up on our website right now, which is eecbg.energy.gov. That's www.eecbg.energy.gov. Hopefully, you've all been there before. We are posting this amendment up there so you can read on paper everything that I've just told you.
So thank you, Charlie. I'll turn it back over to you.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you. Very important update. Hopefully, everybody got that info. So once again, I've switched to the slide that goes through the specific registration requirements, acquiring a DUNS number, registering with CCR, and registering with FedConnect. So hopefully you can go through each of those through those websites. I won't spend a lot of time on that here today so that we can get mainly to questions. And then the numbers here that Johanna talked about in terms of getting help from any of those entities to finish that process.
Again, I'm not going to go through in super detail this time around on the process. Hopefully, you've seen the slides. You will need to download the package of forms, some of which are from grants.gov, some of which you create yourselves, and then put that package together.
Next Slides: FedConnect Process
Charlie Hemmeline:
We have some slides here on the FedConnect process. Again, if you haven't already kind of gone through this, it may be a little too late for that and you may need to submit the email, but the slides are here for your reference on exactly how to get registered with FedConnect, how to find the FOA that is for the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant, and then how to view all of the particular files and the latest amendments with each of those FOA documents.
Next Slides: Application Documents
Charlie Hemmeline:
And so in addition to the attachments that are in the FOA, there's the grants.gov package and a series of documents that are listed here in these slides. Your budget file, SF424, budget justification, and a series of other pieces. The key kind of planning components would be your project activity files, your Attachment B1, that really walk through the substance of what you plan to do with that money, and then that will role up into an EECS document that is Attachment D that will describe how those pieces fit together into an overall strategy for how you plan to spend those dollars. And so all of that comes together and all of these files will need to be uploaded via FedConnect, and if for some reason that doesn't work out, through the email address that Johanna just mentioned.
So there are a series of documents here, disclosures and assurances. One of the key assurances that we want to make sure that everybody has is the assurance that tells us that you are the right entity to apply for these funds. It is important for us to know that we're not receiving three applications from the same city or county and so that assurance identifies the appropriate official who is authorized to receive those funds, so that's very important.
Next Slides: Attachments and Questions
Charlie Hemmeline:
The attachments are here on FedConnect, each of the things that are not included in grants.gov that I mentioned. There is a way to submit questions on FedConnect and we encourage you to do that. We also encourage you to look through the past questions, look at the FAQ's that are on our main block grant website where we've addressed a lot of the issues that we've heard up to date. That address is eecbg.energy.gov and it's really kind of our go to for program information, for the frequently asked questions, and a lot of details on what's eligible and that sort of thing.
Next Slides: Application Documents
Charlie Hemmeline:
So a few more slides here on FedConnect, which I'll just kind of scroll through quickly to make sure that you've seen and download these slides. We're getting to questions as quickly as possible and hopefully all of those have been posted. I'm not gonna go through in detail this piece on the documents included in the application. That's listed in the FOA and the slides here.
So I'm gonna go ahead and take the opportunity to jump over to some questions. I did want to spend the majority of time on that to make sure that we're addressing specific things. Lisa Kuzniar from the National Energy Technology Lab has joined us. Thank you, Lisa, for being here. We're gonna try to scroll through these as quickly as possible. I'll ask them of Johanna if they are program related questions and I will ask them of you if they are kind of process and application specific. Does that sound okay?
Lisa Kuzniar:
Sounds good.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great, thank you. First question comes from Shawn. He asks what is a lobbying registrant, the city? And then do I list the individual from the firm we hired to lobby? That question is for you, Lisa. Does that make sense?
Lisa Kuzniar:
Yeah, and I would answer that for the lobbying registrant, you will put the entity who's submitting the application and then you can also go ahead and identify the individual's name, and that way we would be safe to have both pieces of information on the form.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you. I understand that the lobbying assurance is optional. It's only if the city is undertaking lobbying activities?
Lisa Kuzniar:
That is correct.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Okay, great. Thank you. Next question here is from MaryAnn for Johanna. Will there be additional FOA opportunities in the near future?
Johanna Zetterberg:
Yes, MaryAnn, there will be, and FOA, by the way, stands for Funding Opportunity Announcement. There will be a FOA released on the competitive grant monies that are part of this Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant program that is roughly $455 million in competitive funding that will be available. About 55 million of that is going to be for cities and counties that are not eligible for a direct formula grant from DOE and the remaining merely 400 million is probably likely going to be for all of the types of governments that are eligible for any program dollar under this program, whether it's through your state or from DOE directly. We will be releasing the FOA for the competitive money soon, probably late summer, early fall, so you can look for that on our website and we'll be reaching out through all the channels that we've been reaching out thus far to let you know when that is available.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you, Johanna, and I'd also add just that within EERE, our umbrella organization, the other programs have funding opportunities that are available on a regular basis, both Recovery Act and regular. So I would like at eere.energy.gov to look at opportunities in biomass, wind, solar, building technologies, and other things that could be appropriate for local governments. A good place to look.
So I will jump to the next question. I believe, Lisa, this is probably best for you from Fred. What is the difference between the program contact and project contact?
Lisa Kuzniar:
Fred, there is no difference. They can be the same person. It would be the technical - what I would consider to be the technical point of contact for your project.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great, thank you. I had a quick question for the email address for alternative submission other than FedConnect. I went ahead and switched back to that slide. It's there, the eecbg@netl.doe.gov. Take a look at that and John has something to add, too.
Johanna Zetterberg:
Just, by the way, please do not submit through FedConnect and through the email address. We would like you to choose one or the other. We would like you to start with FedConnect and if you are unsuccessful there, then go ahead and submit through the email address. Thanks. That is eecbg@netl.doe.gov.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great, thank you. Another question here from Fred probably for Lisa. For the proposed EECBG budget, should it be the total budget including leveraged funds or just the allocated funds?
Lisa Kuzniar:
I'm thinking.
Charlie Hemmeline:
No problem.
Johanna Zetterberg:
Lisa, I think it's the not including the leveraged funds because that is on a separate line. I believe it's just the allocated funds. Is that right?
Lisa Kuzniar:
And I'm kind of agreeing. That's what I'm thinking. I'm thinking the budget form itself should just reflect the allocated funds or the allocation amount and then you should address the leveraged funds as _____ application _____ email. I don't know if there's a place on the activity sheet, I need to pull it up, if there's a line there just to identify the funds that are being leveraged. So that will, therefore, I mean the leveraged funds will be identified in your application. They just would not be rolled up into the budget.
Charlie Hemmeline:
That makes sense, and I'll also just add on a previous webinar, we discussed our benefits calculator to talk about expected benefits that you plan to realize from the investment that you're making, and the slides from that webinar are available on our website on the archived webcast page, as well as the calculator itself and user guide is on the application resource page of our solution center, also available via the EECBG page. And in that calculator, there's a way to distinguish between program dollars, allocated dollars, and leveraged funds so that you can make the appropriate aggregate benefit calculation.
Next question comes from Howard. This, I believe, is for Johanna. Will you talk about the Climate Showcase Communities application?
Johanna Zetterberg:
No. We're talking today about the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant program. The Climate Showcase Communities is an entirely separate program and we're not speaking to that today.
Charlie Hemmeline:
But we appreciate your interest. A question from Monica. I think Johanna just discussed when will the competition grant funds be available and I believe we said late summer, early fall that that's expected to open up, so do keep an eye out for that. And follow up to that, will the application process for the competitive funds be similar to this one? I'll go ahead and take that and just say that the same eligible categories, the same overall kind of scope of the program and the intent is the same, but the process will be a little bit different in that it will be a competitive merit reviewed process and so it will have specific criteria for judging one application against another as opposed to this formula award process, which is just ensuring that you are spending the money appropriately and in the eligible categories.
Many of the forms that you will need to fill out to access the competitive funds will be the same so that this information is still very relevant. Things like the SF424A and budget justification file, those are standard for nearly all federal funding opportunities that we put out so that will be the same, but in terms of the specific content, the specific criteria, it will be tailored to that FOA.
A question here for Johanna from George - oh, no, question for Lisa, sorry. From George, the city of Menifi is not included on the allocation sheet for cities because he says they are a new city. How do they get their application - or their allocation, sorry?
Johanna Zetterberg:
Sorry, Lisa, I will take that question. The list of eligible entities, which are entities just means governments here, that the department has published on its website is the official list of governments that are eligible for a formula grant from the department under this program. If your city is not on that list, then you are not eligible, and by the way, the Attached A of the Funding Opportunity Announcement also has a full list of these eligible entities. So if you're not on this list, that means you're not eligible for a direct formula grant but you are eligible for grant monies through your state. States are receiving some program dollars. They have a requirement to pass on at least 60 percent of that allocation to the cities and counties that are not eligible for a direct formula grant from DOE.
So if that is your situation, I would urge you to contact your state energy office and ask them what their process is for making these sub grants. You can find contact information for your state energy office at the following website, www.naseo.org. That's www.na "s" as in Sam, eo.org. That is the National Association of State Energy Officials of which your state energy office is a member.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you, Johanna. A question here from Robert I think probably for you, Lisa. For a streetlight LED replacement project, total cost approximately $215,000.00, do we need to submit a completed 424A form?
Lisa Kuzniar:
No, you wouldn't. The way the question explains, I would assume that that is one of the projects that would be included in your whole strategy document. So therefore, you would identify that budget amount of the budget line in your activity sheet and those costs for that project would be rolled into the SF424A along with the other project costs under your application.
Charlie Hemmeline:
So there's just one SF424A for your entire allocation, then.
Lisa Kuzniar:
Right. The 424A should represent the total allocation amount and identify the cost-by-cost category for that allocation amount.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you. Another question from Monica on the competitive. I'll just answer that quickly. Will the applicants for the competitive funds that were not a part of these formula grants be given some kind of preference when applying for the competitive? And the answer is no, not a preference, but there is a portion of the competitive funding that has been held back, set aside, for those entities that were too small to receive direct formula funds from DOE, so it's roughly 50 million of the 400 million will be set aside for those entities in a separate competitive piece, so that hopefully will make that eligible for those entities.
Lisa Kuzniar:
We'll provide more information. I'm sure we'll have webcasts once the competitive Funding Opportunity Announcement is available, and at that point we'll know a lot more detail that we can go over with you on those opportunities.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Thank you. Let's see. Yeah, question here from Tina. I believe this is for you, Lisa. If I'm a grant administrator representing a town and I'm submitting an application on behalf of the town through my email, does my company need to be mentioned on the assurance page? Currently, the town is only submitting one grant.
Lisa Kuzniar:
Okay. Can you repeat that, Charlie?
Charlie Hemmeline:
Sure. That was kind of a long one. If I am a grant administrator representing a town and I am submitting the application on behalf of the town through my email, does my company need to be mentioned on the assurance page?
Lisa Kuzniar:
Yes, I would recommend it.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Okay, excellent. And a follow up also from Tina. Also, as a grant writer, do I need to complete the disclosure form? I do not consider myself a lobbying.
Lisa Kuzniar:
No, I don't think so. If you're just writing the grant on behalf of the town, you would not have to fill out that form, no.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Okay, great. Let's see, a couple from Tina, here. Maybe for Lisa, where do I attach the map for the environmental form?
Lisa Kuzniar:
I would probably, because I'm not sure if you are able to actually attach it in the environmental questionnaire document, therefore I would just submit it as a separate attachment to your application and just identify it as Nepa Map 1, Nepa Map 2, or depending on how many maps you're gonna submit.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great, thank you. A question here from Carl that I'll tee up for Johanna. We're proposing a nitrogen tire filling station. Which activity would that fall under?
Johanna Zetterberg:
Carl, I'd suggest you put that under transportation programs.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Okay, makes sense. I've got a question from Richard that kind of got cut off. I wonder, Richard, if you could resubmit the second half of your question. A question from Ken for Johanna. Can you add new projects as the program moves forward that were not included in the original strategy document but was identified as a program that would help implement your strategy?
Johanna Zetterberg:
Lisa, if you want to answer that one. You want to repeat the question?
Charlie Hemmeline:
Sure, Lisa it's can you add new projects as the program moves forward that were not included in the original strategy document or identified as a program - as programs that would help implement their strategy?
Lisa Kuzniar:
Yes, I believe that you will be able to probably address that through a subsequent amendment to your award document with your ruling agency. So if you didn't have any projects identified up front, _____ _____ see that there were additional projects that you wanted to add after your award was already in place, you could do that through an amendment to your grant award.
Johanna Zetterberg:
Lisa, this is Johanna. I'll just ask a follow up question to that. If an applicant knows that that situation might come to pass but might not, would they mention it in their application now or would they just bring it up once they know whether or not they'll be moving in that direction.
Lisa Kuzniar:
At this point in time, I don't think it would hurt to go ahead and mention them up front in their application. They could just add a miscellaneous attachment or a general attachment saying these are projects that we either we have not yet fully defined but would hope to be able to include in our strategy.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you. A question here from Susan and Althea for Johanna. What program would geothermal well development fall under?
Johanna Zetterberg:
Susan, it's a little hard to answer your question. Maybe you can resubmit and provide a little bit more detail but I'll take a stab at it now. Geothermal technologies are renewable energy technologies and so you would need to make sure that that project is connected to a government building owned by your grantee government and that that project was feeding directly to the building power that will feed the power consumption of that building. It could be in the building, on the building, or on the site of the building and physically connected to the building. If all those conditions are met, then that would fall under the activity of renewal energy technology installations on government buildings.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you. A question here from Carl and I'll give this one to Johanna. We have a program that provides certificates for compact fluorescent bulbs. Is that going to be a financial incentive program?
Johanna Zetterberg:
My hunch is no at this point. I should make the disclaimer that I can't pre-approve any activities right now. We're just discussing this at this point. But the financial incentive mechanism is really something like a grant or a loan program or a rebate program that has a very high impact element to it. Certificates for compact fluorescent bulbs, while a great thing to do because they do reduce energy consumption, is not the highest impact activity out there and we are really promoting the use of these funds to get at those high impact activities.
Some other activities under that funding category are things like revolving loan programs, loan guarantee programs, things of that nature. So I hope that's helpful to you.
Charlie Hemmeline:
But, yeah, sorry, I guess the question is that is it the financial incentive category or building retrofit category, perhaps?
Johanna Zetterberg:
Okay. If you were going to propose it, go ahead and put it under financial incentive program, yes.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Okay. A question from Sean I think probably for you, Lisa, another detail question about the lobbying disclosure form. It says that 10a asks for the lobbying registrant and then the fill in boxes are for an individual name. Then 10b asks for another name of the individual performing services and so he's just wondering what's the difference between that and the registrant?
Lisa Kuzniar:
The registrant would be the entity, I would think, who was submitting the application and the individual performing the services is the actual lobbyist that they have hired or they've engaged.
Charlie Hemmeline:
So the firm is the registrant and the -
Lisa Kuzniar:
Yeah, the organization, the phone, the county, the city, the whoever you have hired to perform - whatever organization or _____, no. Take _____ _____. It's the applicant. Whoever is the applicant or the entity, that would be the registrant and then the individual would be the individual who was actually doing the lobbying activities, and that's probably the best answer. Again, I'm not familiar enough with that form. I don't see it enough. If you're confused, do the best that you can to complete the form. It's not like your application is gonna get thrown out if it's not complete. We'll just have to follow up with you through negotiation.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you.
Johanna Zetterberg:
Can I make a follow up answer to the answer just provided to Carl about the program for certificates for compact fluorescent bulbs? Carl, you could also or instead propose that activity under the other appropriate activity category. That might be a better place for it.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you. A question here from Haley probably for you, Lisa, and I wonder if others have this one, too. We've already submitted our application and would like to modify one of our attachments. Is it okay to withdraw the application and resubmit before the deadline?
Lisa Kuzniar:
I'm not sure if the original application could be withdrawn out of FedConnect. And I don't know enough about the FedConnect system, if that's a possibility. If they need to revise an attachment, I would go ahead and advise them to do so and resubmit and just - I'm trying to think how they're gonna get loaded in. I'd just have them go ahead and call it a second scenario revised application.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Okay, so it stands out and we could just take the -
Lisa Kuzniar:
Here's what I would recommend. When you're naming your files under the UIC code, your using a unique identification code, I would go ahead at the end of that naming, that file naming code, to go ahead and put "revision" so that it will stand out when it comes through and the same in your transmittal through FedConnect. Because it comes up as an email, and then in that little body that you can submit some information, I would just have them note in there that this is a revision to an application that was submitted and it would help us if they could identify the date that the other application was submitted on.
Johanna Zetterberg:
Just make sure that you put your DUNS number on that second submittal so that we can identify you and be able to see that you've already submitted something.
Charlie Hemmeline:
And we have a clarification from Carl. The unique identification code that we called that previously to be in the body - in the subject line of the email is that DUNS number?
Lisa Kuzniar:
No.
Johanna Zetterberg:
No.
Charlie Hemmeline:
No. Okay, _____ clarification on that, then. So the unique identification code that we were referring to to submit on the email is actually a separate code. _____ _____ _____ _____ Lisa, if you'd like to describe it.
[Crosstalk]
Lisa Kuzniar:
Yeah, it's identified on Pages 14 and 15 of the Funding Opportunity Announcement. They differ, depending on if you're a state applicant or a union, a local government, or an Indian tribe. Please go to Page 14 of the Funding Opportunity Announcement under Section C, Content and Form of Application. The FOA goes into great detail on how to construct your code. It's very simple but you do need to follow the directions there. It's basically there's a number assigned to you depending on what type of government you are, if you're a city or a state or a tribe, etc. So please go ahead to Page 14 of the FOA and follow those instructions in creating your unique identification code.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you. A question here from Elizabeth. We have projects for both residences and commercial buildings. Because they fall under the same activity category, do we list them on the same sheet or do we submit two different sheets?
Lisa Kuzniar:
And _____ _____ was for me and I need you to repeat the question.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Sure. It's we have projects for both residences and commercial buildings. Because they fall under the same activity category, do we list them on the same sheet or do we submit two different sheets? I presume, the project activity sheets.
Lisa Kuzniar:
You can list them on the same sheet.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you. Let's see. Let's go back here. There was a question from Tina earlier. I wonder if you could resubmit with spelling out the acronyms that you used. That would be helpful.
A question from Gary wondering whether the start and end date listed, I assume, on the project activity sheets, are estimates only, and that is correct. I'm getting the head nod from several.
Johanna Zetterberg:
We're just scrolling through your questions here to make sure that we get all the relevant questions for this webcast.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Yeah. We've gotten to most of them here. We've just got a couple left. Bear with us. That one?
Female:
Yeah, that one.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Okay. A question for you, Lisa, from Richard. For agencies submitting the EEC strategy and ready to go projects whose dollar value is less than the agency's formula amount, should the balance for future projects be placed in the 424A and 424 forms or just the amount of what they've got ready to go?
Lisa Kuzniar:
The 424 form should reflect the total allocation amount. The 424A should only reflect the dollar amount of the ready to go projects and the EEC or strategy, because you're not gonna have the cost information for those other projects yet. When you get ready to submit those additional ready to go projects, you'll have to submit a revised 424A at that time.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you. We'll just take a couple more here. Please submit your final questions. We'll try to get to the rest. A question from Sean. On the budget sheet, what is the first quarter of the first year? Is it January to March of 2009 or the first three months after the award?
Lisa Kuzniar:
The first quarter would be the first three months after award.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Okay, great. Thank you. All right, the question from Tina is about direct digital control systems and time of day settings and what eligible activity does that fall under. I believe that would be eligible, if I understand what that is, if it's regarding building control systems that get at reducing the electricity use of the building through automation and controls. And I think that would be eligible under the Category 6, Energy Efficiency and Conservation Programs for Buildings and Facilities, so you would just describe those activities there.
One more for Gary real quick. It said to attach a copy of the calculator spreadsheet with the activity worksheet. Is it okay to name it Calculator Activity 2?
Lisa Kuzniar:
You can name it whatever you want, Gary.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Yeah, I think that's just another final to submit.
Lisa Kuzniar:
Yeah, you can choose the naming convention of that document.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Excellent.
Lisa Kuzniar:
Glad you're using the calculator.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Well, I think we've gotten to all of the questions here today. One final one from Tina that I think will have relevance to everyone. If something is incorrect on your application, will we have a chance to revise it during the scoring process? I think I'll just make a general statement that we're gonna try to work with you on all of this material to ensure it's complete and correct and eligible. So in all cases, if something - if we need some more information, we'll be getting in touch with you to make that correct and complete. So the answer is yes, we'll work with you on that.
All right, so we have a follow up from Robert for Lisa, I think. Following up on the 424A question, our total allocation is 215,000.00 and we intend to use all of it on that LED replacement that we mentioned a minute ago. It is not clear from the FOA announcement if we even need to submit a 424A.
Lisa Kuzniar:
Yes, you do need to submit a 424A and if the LED project is the total allocation amount, that's the amount that would be reflected on the 424 and the 424A.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Okay, great. Thank you. I have a FedConnect questions here and maybe Ralph and Lisa can try to tackle. I understand that we upload our deliverables through FedConnect but I don't see where to upload.
Ralph Nine:
If you're referring to project deliverables, they will be - we will give you a site at a later time where it will be uploaded. We only uploaded the application through FedConnect, not the deliverables.
Lisa Kuzniar:
If you're referring to the application itself, then -
Ralph Nine:
Right. If you mean deliverables as a portion of the application, yes, it all comes up through FedConnect. And if it's not one of those specific filenames, you can use the other files submission button.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great, thank you, and I'll just throw one last one over to Lisa that I'm sure is on everyone's mind. How soon will the funds be released after the application deadline?
Lisa Kuzniar:
I don't know. I don't have a specific date. I am hoping that once after the application deadline that we will start seeing _____ being made within 30 to 60 days. So it will depend on when you actually get through the negotiation process with the awarding agency who will then be responsible for negotiating your award and when that award gets in place and it should - the funding should be in place within a couple of days after _____ _____ signed.
Johanna Zetterberg:
And you can all help us out by submitting applications that are complete and filled out correctly to the best of your knowledge and abilities. That would definitely help speed things along.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Absolutely, and Sue squeezed one in here at the deadline. I'll go ahead and ask this one of you, Lisa. On the 424A, where do we list the administration costs?
Lisa Kuzniar:
I'm not sure exactly what she means by administration costs. Typically we see fringe benefits and indirect costs, so there are lines on 424A for those types of expenses. If she's talking about administrative personnel costs, that would be rolled up into the personnel line item and then the indirects and fringes associated with those personnel costs would be in the lines identified. And she would have to categorize them how the accounting system is set up. I'm not sure what she's breaking out. I would assume that the administrative expenses would be some support personnel and the actual personnel costs for those would be on the personnel line and then any fringe and indirects associated with that would be on those respective lines of the 424A.
Charlie Hemmeline:
Great. Thank you. And I'll just close with one final question here from Virginia. For local governments not listed for direct funding, how soon will application information and deadlines be available? And I'll just say that as Johanna mentioned, the - your state will actually be the ones who will be administering those funds and so you should get in touch with your state energy office to identify what process they are going to be using to administer those funds. If you do not know your state energy office or contact info, we recommend that you get in touch with the organization called NASEO, the National Association of State Energy Officials, at www.naseo.org.
So with that, I believe we will wrap. Thank you very much for joining. Thank you, Lisa, for taking the time to answer a lot of the great questions here today. Good luck, everyone -
Lisa Kuzniar:
Oh, you're welcome. I apologize for being late.
Charlie Hemmeline:
No worries. You're _____ the way on the state energy programs. I saw all the great announcements. That's good stuff.
So we will hopefully see all of your applications tomorrow and look forward to reading about all the great activities. So good luck to everyone and please download these slides and go over anything you need to there. Thanks very much. Have a great day.