Dear Nonprofit Security Friends,
A few updates in the final stretch of the calendar year.
I. FY 2025 NSGP Funding Opportunity:
We are experiencing an NSGP grant cycle like no other.
Never before has there been a level of disengagement and disenfranchisement between FEMA’s Grant Programs Directorate with the State Administrative Agencies (SAAs) and the nonprofit stakeholder community.
The cycle has been defined by late, staggard, and incomplete grant guidance, unexplained (and unpublished) policy and funding decisions (and lack of funding decisions), an absence of stakeholder training, technical assistance, shared or posted notices, updates, and alerts, or even a point of contact.
The previous uniformity of process that made the NSGP program a coordinated, coherent, and accountable program across the States was largely absent for the 2024 NSS funding opportunity and even more so in the present FY 2025 cycle.
While the NSGP application process and program administration have never been perfect, there were efforts within FEMA to advance and improve stakeholder relationships (and a reliable program lead) and legislative efforts to address program and funding short cummings.
The program has followed a predictable, congressionally mandated timeline for years that is now being ignored. The NSGP application process generally took place between February and August, with SAAs receiving FEMA award notifications before September 30, and nonprofits receiving SAA grant acceptance letters between October and November (if not sooner).
In the present FY 2025 environment, twelve State Attorneys General have filed a lawsuit against the Administration challenging their policy and funding decisions surrounding the preparedness grants. This is a fist.
Every SAA has had to act for and by themselves in terms of navigating last year’s (FY 2025 ended September 30th) hollowed out application process. Some have completed the application process, some are just starting it, and others are still waiting, leaving nonprofit applicants across the country with an uneven and unreliable funding opportunity.
Last week, I worked with a client to complete a Florida application, which was due on Friday, December 12. That same day, I received notification from the Oregon Department of Emergency Management (OEM) that they just opened their application process with a January 15, 2026, deadline. The New York State Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services has only posted a place holder message: “The next round of the NSGP is expected to be released soon.”
One bit of information I gleaned from the OEM notification is that they “must submit project proposals to FEMA by Friday January 30, 2026.” Presumably, this deadline originated from a FEMA communication to OEM and could possibly apply to ALL SAAs.
OEM also maintains a “Federal Update” page, which includes what I have found to be the most organized and useful archive of preparedness grant programs (including FY 2025 NSGP) details. I recommend ALL interested parties keep tabs on this page regularly: https://www.oregon.gov/oem/Pages/Federal-Changes.aspx.
II. FEMA Overhaul Spotlight:
Last week, the FEMA Review Council was scheduled to meet to deliberate and vote on a much-anticipated final report on FEMA reform recommendations. White House officials abruptly interceded to cancel the 12-member council meeting just moments before it was set to begin.
The interruption occurred reportedly after and in reaction to a news outlet’s sharing details of a leaked copy of the final report.
According to CNN, Council report recommendations included “the most sweeping overhaul of FEMA in decades, dramatically reducing the federal agency’s role in disaster response by cutting its workforce in half and rolling out a new block grant system designed to get aid to communities faster and with less bureaucratic hassle.”
The article also focused on apparent heavy-handed interference, changes, or elimination of recommendations made by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to the Council’s recommendations in previous iterations of the report draft. While Council appointees by the President are mostly Republican, they are considered to be experienced and expert in emergency management matters.
The article may be read in its entirety at: https://www.cnn.com/2025/12/10/politics/fema-council-report-recommend-downsizing-overhaul.
Neither DHS, FEMA, nor the White House have announced a rescheduling of the meeting.
III. Protecting the NSGP Program:
Notably, the FEMA preparedness programs that support State and local counterterrorism efforts, including the NSGP program, have been absent from what has been discussed in the context of FEMA’s potential overhaul or demise.
However, they will need a home and what comes of these programs could significantly harm the NSGP program, which has relied upon centralized guidelines, program administration, and a distinct funding stream.
I have explained this concern in past congressional statements for the record and testimonies I have written for myself and others, in support of NSGP over the years.
The following are pertinent parts from testimony I drafted for a March 2017 hearing of the Subcommittee on Economic Development, Public Buildings, and Emergency Management Subcommittee of the House Committee on Transportation & Infrastructure Committee to “Examine National Preparedness System and Capabilities:”
“Prior to the establishment of the NSGP program, there was no committed, coordinated, uniform, centralized program that promoted and ensured that at-risk nonprofit institutions participated in and benefited from meaningful Federal, state, and local homeland security efforts…
The Nonprofit Security Grant Program has become an essential component of the preparedness grant programs at FEMA. With a continuing and growing record of threats, attempted attacks, and deadly occurrences targeting Jewish communal institutions, as well to other vulnerable populations within the nonprofit sector, we believe there is ample justification for Congress to maintain the Nonprofit Security Grant Program as a singular, stand-alone initiative as a matter of national security, and should consider ways to strengthen the program, not dismantle it…
Conversely, we strongly believe that any effort to replace the NSGP program as part of a consolidation of the larger preparedness grant programs would disenfranchise at-risk nonprofit stakeholders, who could not be expected to meaningfully participate in or effectively compete with larger, more formidable and connected stakeholders for resources in an integrated competitive process. Such a move would dilute the connectivity and continuity between the local stakeholders and the State Administrative Agencies, as well between national stakeholders [ ], and FEMA.”
The complete testimony may be viewed at: https://transportation.house.gov/calendar/eventsingle.aspx?EventID=401218.
In my view, the reformation or undoing of FEMA could result in the status quo ante for nonprofit stakeholders before NSGP became a program. Federal responsibility, oversight, and funding could be cut, and the program administration and resources could revert to the States and localities in a widely disparate and unequal application of interest and support, leaving nonprofit stakeholders to fend for themselves.
As FEMA reform considerations continue, NSGP advocates should be strenuously advocating that the Administration and Congress protect NSGP as a committed, coordinated, uniformly funded and administered, centralized, competitive program in partnership with the States, territories, localities, and nonprofit stakeholders.
Best,
Rob Goldberg
Principal
Goldberg & Associates LLC
In partnership with Sphere State
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