Environmental Justice Small Grant Program

This program has been terminated.

The Environmental Justice Small Grants (EJSG) Program provides funding directly to community-based organizations for projects that help residents of underserved communities understand and address local environmental and public health issues. The term “underserved community” refers to a community with environmental justice concerns and/or vulnerable populations, including people of color, low income, rural, tribal, indigenous, and homeless populations that may be disproportionately impacted by environmental harms and risks. In general, the EJSG program awards grants that support community-driven projects designed to engage, educate, and empower communities to better understand and address local environmental and public health issues. Community-driven projects are projects that include activities where community residents and/or representatives are integrally involved in the thinking behind and execution of those activities. Therefore, applying organizations should have a direct connection to the underserved community impacted by environmental harms and risks.

An eligible applicant must be one of the following: • incorporated non-profit organizations —including, but not limited to, community-based organizations, grassroots organizations, environmental justice networks, faith based organizations and those affiliated with religious institutions;* U.S. Territories • Tribal governments, must be either federally-recognized or state-recognized – including Alaska Native Villages • tribal organizations * • Freely Associated States (FAS) – including local governmental entities and local non-profit organizations in the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, and Palau. Applicant organizations claiming non-profit status must include documentation that shows the organization is either a 501(c) (3) non-profit organization as designated by the Internal Revenue Service; OR a non-profit organization recognized by the state, territory, commonwealth or tribe in which it is located. For the latter, documentation must be on official state government letterhead. Applicants must be located within the same state, territory, commonwealth, or tribe in which the proposed project is located. This means that an applicant’s registered address of record (i.e., the address designated on their IRS or State-sanctioned documentation) must be in the same state, territory, commonwealth or tribe as the location of the proposed project. The following entities are INELIGIBLE to receive an award, but we encourage applicants to partner with these organizations, as appropriate: • colleges and universities; • hospitals; • for-profit businesses; • state and local governments and their entities; • quasi-governmental entities (e.g., water districts, utilities)*; • national organizations and chapters of the aforementioned organizations**; •International organizations and chapters of the aforementioned organizations • Individuals • non-profit organizations supporting lobbying activities as defined in Section 3 of the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995; and*** * Generally, a quasi-governmental entity is one that: (1) has a close association with the government agency, but is not considered a part of the government agency; (2) was created by the government agency, but is exempt from certain legal and administrative requirements imposed on government agencies; or (3) was not created by the government agency but performs a public purpose and is significantly supported financially by the government agency. ** National organizations are defined as comprising of one centralized headquarters or principal place of business that creates and controls the mission, structure and work carried out by its chapters or affiliates. *** Funds awarded under this program may not be used to support lobbying activities or any activities related to lobbying or the appearance thereof. Subawards made to nonprofit organizations that lobby are not allowed. 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.

Eligible beneficiaries are the Non-Profit Community Groups as described under "Applicant Eligibility" above, and the residents of the communities they serve. List selected may not be all inclusive.

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.

Approximately 150 days after the application submission due date.