Category: Federal Agency Developments

The Senate confirmed former Washington State Governor Gary Locke as Commerce Secretary yesterday. As Secretary, Locke will oversee National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Weather Service, as well as the census, some international trade issues, and the switch to digital TV. Read more

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has released details on how it will spend funding provided in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

Key points of the NSF plan include the following:

• NSF will use a large share of its ARRA funding to address the backlog of existing proposals.  The notice states, “With the exception of the Major Research Instrumentation, Academic Research Infrastructure and Science Masters programs, the majority of proposals eligible for Recovery Act funding include those that are already in house and will be reviewed and/or awarded prior to September 30, 2009…NSF also will consider proposals declined on or after October 1, 2008.”
• Proposals supported with ARRA funds will have to be expended in a timely fashion. The notice states, “Given the goals of the Recovery Act, awardees will be informed that they are expected to expend funds in a timely manner on allowable award costs and that NSF will be monitoring awards for expenditures. If, after 12 months, no allowable expenditures have taken place, NSF may consider reducing or terminating the award and reallocating the funds.”
• All grants issued with Recovery Act funds will be standard grants with durations of up to five years. The notice says this approach “will allow NSF to structure a sustainable portfolio.”
• Funding for new principal investigators and high-risk, high-return research will be a top priority for ARRA funding.

On March 19th, the Senate confirmed John Holdren as Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and Jane Lubchenco as Administrator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Both nominations had been placed on hold. Some senators attempted to bring about changes in unrelated legislative issues by blocking the nominations. However, the legislative tactic was dropped and the nominations moved forward without much objection to the actual nominees.

On the same day, NOAA budget officials expressed gratitude for the FY09 increase in NOAA research funding. By the end of April, NOAA should have details on its website about FY09 programs and projects funded. NOAA officials also expressed concerns about the ability of Grants.gov to handle the surge in traffic related to Recovery Act funding, given that the system experiences difficulties under normal circumstances. The possibility exists that grantmaking agencies could temporarily go back to a paper submission process. NOAA revealed that the FY10 budget development process is taking place slowly, and that the release of the President’s budget request could be after May 1st. NOAA remains undecided on how it will use much of the funding provided in the Recovery Act, but expects to release details by mid-April.

The National Center for Research Resources, part of the National Institutes of Health, will hold a videocast on Monday, March 23, 2009, 1:00 – 2:30 p.m. EDT, to respond to questions about the application process for core facilities improvement projects (RFA-RR-09-007) and construction, renovation and repair improvement projects (RFA-RR-09-008). This session will replace the previously planned Web seminar that experienced technical difficulties. The videocast is open to the public.

Prior to the videocast, please review the NCRR staff slides from the March 16 Web seminar and the FAQs as many questions and answers already have been addressed and are available on our Web site.
• Overview Slides
• FAQ — Extramural Research Facilities Improvement Program (C06)
• FAQ — Core Facility Renovation, Repair and Improvement (G20)

If you have questions that are not addressed above, please submit them to constructionncrr@mail.nih.gov. This mailbox is open now, and will be open during the videocast. The videocast will be archived and available on the NCRR Web site after the session.

Videocast Details
Date: Monday, March 23, 2009
Time: 1:00 – 2:30 p.m. EDT
URL: http://videocast.nih.gov
Questions: constructionncrr@mail.nih.gov

To learn more about videocasting, visit videocast.nih.gov/faq. It is a good idea to visit this site prior to March 23 to make sure that you have the right software to view the videocast. For more information and updates about funding opportunities under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 visit NCRR’s ARRA information page, on the Web at www.ncrr.nih.gov/recovery.

The Association of American Universities (AAU) and the Council on Government Relations (COGR) recently sent a letter to Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Directer Peter Orszag on the need to overhaul the Grants.gov system. AAU and COGR explain that Grants.gov, initiated as a unified grants application and submission portal, has proven unable to cope with the volume of grant submissions -even under normal circumstances. They go on to express that the volume of applications generated by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act will only worsen the situation.  Continue reading “AAU and COGR Seek Grants.gov Overhaul”