New PA Community Facilities Grant for Anchor Institutions

January 8, 2024

Attached: CapitalProjectsFundBroadbandMultiPurposeCommunities-Guidelines_2023_jan_24

The PA Broadband Authority has released a new $45 million competitive grant aimed to provide funding to schools, libraries, local governments, etc. to construct, purchase or improve facilities that are or will be open to the public and will directly enable work, education, and health monitoring at the respective facility.  The grant guidelines are attached and additional information can be found at: https://dced.pa.gov/programs/covid-19-arpa-pa-multi-purpose-community-facilities-program/.

Applications may be submitted from January 11, 2024 through April 9, 2024.  Grants will range from $250,000 – $2 million.

Funds may be used for any of the following eligible costs:

1. Pre-project development costs and uses, including data-gathering; feasibility studies; community engagement and public feedback processes; equity assessments and planning, and needs assessments; permitting, planning, architectural design, and engineering design; and work related to environmental, historical, and cultural reviews.
2. Costs of repair, rehabilitation, construction, improvement, and acquisition of real property, equipment (e.g., devices and office equipment), and facilities.
3. Ancillary costs necessary to operationalize and put the capital assets to full use, including costs to increase broadband adoption and improve digital literacy.
4. Administrative costs of the applicant to administer the grant are limited to 2.5 percent of the grant award. Administrative costs include costs to complete the grant application, costs associated with monitoring of and reporting on the Project, advertising costs, and personnel costs including salaries and fringe benefits for staff required for carrying out the Project.

It’s my understanding that the PA Broadband Authority will be releasing a video that will review the grant and provide a walkthrough of the Electronic Single Application System that must be used to submit the grant application.  After the video has been released, they will schedule two open office hour sessions.  As soon as we receive more information about the video and office hours, I will share it.   Also, their website says they’ll be posting FAQs soon.  Please read the grant guidelines in their entirety and then be prepared to attend the office hours to ask any questions you may have.

I hope our schools and libraries will take advantage of this exciting new grant opportunity!

— Julie

Julie Tritt Schell
Pennsylvania E-rate Coordinator
717-730-7133 – o
jtschell@comcast.net
www.e-ratepa.org