FY2020 Homeland Security Grant Funding

The federal government cannot tell states and local jurisdictions what to do and how to spend your time preparing for disasters — unless you take their grant money. Then they are the ones calling the shots.

Here’s the announcement on FY 2020 Homeland Security spending, including details on the amounts per category: “DHS Announces Funding Allocations for FY 2022 Preparedness Grants.”

WASHINGTON— Today, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro N.
Mayorkas announced final allocations for $550 million for seven fiscal Year 2022 competitive preparedness grant programs. These allocations, together with the almost $1.5 billion in non-competitive grant funding announced earlier this year, total more than $2 billion in FY 2022 to help prepare our nation against man-made threats and natural disasters.

The grant programs provide funding to state, local, tribal and territorial governments, nonprofit agencies and the private sector to
build and sustain capabilities to prevent, protect against, respond to
and recover from acts of terrorism and other disasters. The total amount for each grant program is set by Congress and the allocations are made by the Secretary.

“As the threats to the homeland evolve, so too must the grant programs intended to prepare communities for those threats,” said
Secretary Mayorkas. “This year, DHS will prioritize six critical areas,
including cybersecurity, soft targets and crowded places, intelligence
and information sharing, domestic violent extremism, community
preparedness and resilience, and election security. These grants will
help to improve the nation’s readiness in preparing, responding to, and recovering from terrorist attacks, major disasters, and other
emergencies.”

Grant recipients under the State Homeland Security Program and Urban Area Security Initiative will be required to dedicate a minimum of 30% of their awards across these six priority areas. Twelve percent is required through minimum spend amounts for four priority areas, and recipients have flexibility on how to allocate the remaining 18% across the six priority areas: cybersecurity (no minimum spend); soft target and crowded places (3%); information and intelligence sharing (3%); domestic violent extremism (3%); community preparedness and resilience (3%); and election security (no minimum spend). After extensive consultation with grantees leading up to this announcement, DHS is focused on balancing the need to invest in high priority areas with giving jurisdictions the flexibility to make prioritization decisions based on their own assessments of their needs.