COPS Hiring and Recovery Program (CHRP) Podcast [Introduction: Sandra Webb, Deputy Director, Support] Hello and thank you for downloading this Office of Community Oriented Policing Services podcast. This is Dr. Sandra Webb, Deputy Director of the Support Directorate for the COPS Office. Today’s discussion of the COPS Hiring Recovery Program will be broken down into four parts. First, we will give a brief overview of the program, then, explain eligibility requirements, walk through some pre-application procedures, and finally answer a few frequently asked questions about the program. But before we begin, here are a few words from the Acting Director of the COPS Office, Mr. Timothy Quinn. [Opening Remarks: Timothy Quinn, COPS Acting Director] Hello everyone, on behalf of the COPS Office I am pleased to announce the availability of funding under the COPS Hiring Recovery Program. Nearly 15 years after the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 was signed into law, the COPS Office continues to support the efforts of law enforcement agencies across the country as they develop creative and innovative ways to deal with long-standing community problems and public safety issues. The COPS Hiring Recovery Program is one of several hiring programs developed by the COPS Office to support law enforcement across the nation. This is particularly important as state, local, and tribal law enforcement agencies embrace the challenges of keeping communities safe while maintaining sufficient sworn personnel levels during the time of economic hardship. It is my hope that the information in this podcast will help you gain a better understanding of the COPS Hiring Recovery Program. We look forward to working with all the law enforcement agencies that choose to apply. Now I’d like to turn it over to our Assistant Director of the Grants Administration Division, Andy Dorr, who will give us a brief overview of the program. [Program Overview: Andy Dorr, Assistant Director, Grants Administration Division] Thank you Director Quinn. The COPS Hiring Recovery Program is a competitive grant program designed to address the full-time sworn officer needs of state, local, and tribal law enforcement agencies nationwide. This program provides funding directly to law enforcement agencies for hiring new and also rehiring career law enforcement officers, as part of an effort to create and preserve jobs, and increase agencies’ community policing capacity and crime-prevention efforts. Up to 1 billion dollars in grant funding was appropriated for this initiative through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. COPS Hiring Recovery Program grants will provide 100 percent funding for approved entry-level salaries and fringe benefits of full-time officers for 36 months and there is a 12 month retention period at the conclusion of the grant. These grants may be used on or after the official grant award start date for any of the following: 1. to hire new officer positions (including filling existing officer vacancies that are no longer funded in an agency’s budget); 2. to rehire officers who have been laid off as a result of state, local or tribal budget cuts unrelated to the receipt of grant funding; or 3. to rehire officers who are scheduled to be laid off on a specific future date as a result of state, local or tribal budget cuts, again, unrelated to the receipt of grant funding. There’s no cap on the number of positions your agency may request; however, awards will be limited to available funding. When determining how many officers to request, your agency should be mindful of the initial three-year grant period and consider your agency’s ability to fill and retain the officer positions awarded, while following your agency’s established hiring policies and procedures. There is no local match requirement for COPS Hiring Recovery Program; however, your grant funding requests must be based on the current full-time entry-level salary and benefits package of an officer in your department. If awarded, your agency will be responsible for any additional costs for salaries and benefits that are higher than entry level. The COPS non-supplanting requirement mandates that funds must be used to supplement (or increase) state, local or Bureau of Indian Affairs funds that would have been dedicated toward the grant purpose if federal funding had not been awarded. In other words, grant funds must not be used to supplant (or replace) local funds that your agency would have otherwise devoted to sworn officer hiring. The hiring or rehiring of officers under this program must be in addition to, and not in lieu of, officers who otherwise would have been hired or rehired with local funds. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act requires grantees to report their financial and programmatic progress within 10 days after the end of each calendar quarter. The COPS Office plans to request information from grantees consistent with Section 1512 of the Recovery Act, including collecting information on the number of new jobs created and the number of jobs preserved using COPS Hiring Recovery Program funding. At the end of federal funding, grantees under the program must retain all sworn officer positions for a minimum of 12 months following the 36-month grant period. The retained position(s) should be added to your local law enforcement budget with state or local funds, over and above the number of locally-funded positions that would have existed in the absence of the grant. In your grant application, you’re required to affirm that your agency plans to retain any additional officer positions awarded following the expiration of the grant you’re also required to identify your planned source(s) of retention funding. [Eligibility Requirements: Sandra Webb, Director of Support] Thanks for that information, Andy. Now we’re going to move to Part 2 of the podcast, in which we’ll discuss some of the eligibility requirements of the program. In general, all local, state, and tribal law enforcement agencies that have primary law enforcement authority are eligible to apply for the COPS Hiring Recovery Program. However, there are a few eligibility and non-eligibility conditions you should be aware of: 1. Funding must be used for new, full-time, entry-level sworn law enforcement salaries and fringe benefits, requests for part-time officers and civilians are not allowed.; 2. Agencies cannot apply as a consortium. You must apply as an individual agency.; 3. Start-up agencies are ineligible.; 4. Cities and towns that contract with another law enforcement agency are not eligible to apply for these grants. The law enforcement agencies themselves must apply.; 5. Tribal agencies that are not federally recognized tribes are ineligible.; 6. Of the federally recognized tribal agencies, those that contract with BIA for law enforcement services can still apply for funding, but those that contract with any other law enforcement agency may not apply for funding under this program.; 7. Only agencies that have planned to retain all positions awarded under this grant for 12 months after the three-year grant period are eligible to apply for funding. To determine the eligibility of your agency, you will be required to fill out the COPS Hiring Recovery Program Eligibility Worksheet. This worksheet is an online form that will determine your eligibility, based on your responses to a series of yes or no questions about your agency. If, during the worksheet, you are determined to be ineligible for funding, you will not be able to complete the remainder of the COPS Hiring Recovery Program application. The worksheet can be accessed through the COPS website at www.cops.usdoj.gov. On the funding tab at the top of the screen, click funding opportunities. Then click on COPS Hiring Recovery Program and select the link for the COPS Hiring Recovery Program Eligibility Worksheet. Tim, now that we have discussed eligibility requirements, would you mind walking through a few pre-application procedures for our potential grantees? [Application Procedures: Tim Quinn, Acting Director] Sure, thank you, Sandra. Applications for the COPS Hiring Recovery Program grants will be accepted only online through the COPS Office web site: www.cops.usdoj.gov. The online application materials will be available through April 14. Before you apply, you’ll need to make sure that your agency has sufficient time to complete the following required steps: 1. Visit the "Account Access" portion of the COPS home page to determine if your agency currently has an active online account. If not, you must register for a new account.; 2. Make sure that your agency's Law Enforcement and Government Executive information is current, and also make sure that contact information is current for individuals submitting the COPS Hiring Recovery Program grant application.; 3. If you forget your password or user name, or need assistance with creating an account, call 1.800.421.6770 between 9:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, or e-mail egov.issues@usdoj.gov.; 4. A Data Universal Numbering System (or DUNS) number is required to submit applications for COPS funding. A DUNS number is a unique nine-digit sequence that tracks entities receiving federal funds. Visit www.dnb.com/us to obtain or verify your number.; 5. Additionally, all applicants are required to maintain current registrations in the Central Contractor Registration (CCR) database. The CCR database stores standard information about federal financial assistance applicants, recipients, and sub-recipients. For more information about how to register with the CCR, visit www.ccr.gov. Please note that you must update or renew your CCR at least once per year to maintain an active status. Now we’ll move on to part 4 of our podcast, in which you’ll hear answers to some questions that the COPS Office frequently hears from potential applicants. [Frequently Asked Questions and Answers: Katherine McQuay and Dave Buchanan] Hello, I’m Dave Buchanan and I’m going to ask Katherine McQuay of the COPS Office some questions about the COPS Hiring Recovery Program, also known as CHRP. Q: As a law enforcement agency, what purposes can I use the CHRP funding? A: You can use CHRP funding to hire new officers, rehire officers that have been laid off due to state and local funding cuts and to retain officers that are scheduled to be laid off at a future date. Q: How do I know whether I should apply for funds to hire new officers or rehire officers? A: If your agency has recently laid off officers and wants to rehire them, you can apply for funds to rehire officers who were laid off before you submitted the application – that’s one funding option. If you haven’t laid off officers yet, but have a lay-off scheduled for a specific future date (for example, the officers have been notified that they will be laid off on October 1), you should apply for funds to rehire those officers who are scheduled for a future lay-off. If you do receive funding in that category, you’ll be able to use the COPS HiringRecovery Program funds to “rehire” the officers on October 1, after using the full amount of local funding that is already budgeted for them until the date of the lay-off. You also will not be required to formally lay the officers off through your administrative lay-off procedures, but may transfer them to the CHRP funding as of the lay-off date – in this example, October 1. Finally, if your agency has not or does not plan to lay-off officers, but has eliminated positions through attrition, has cut funding to fill vacancies, or otherwise wishes to increase its current locally-funded sworn officer strength, it should apply for funds to hire new officers. That category of funding – new hires -- includes hiring new officers to fill existing vacancies that are no longer funded in your budget. Q: I’ve heard you mention “unfunded vacancies.” What do you mean by an “unfunded vacancy”? A: A sworn position that has been frozen or unfilled because of budget cuts. For example if you have an authorized strength of 10 officers, but only have funding for 8, you can apply for two officers under CHRP to fill those unfunded vacancies. Q: My city hasn’t reduced the police force yet, but we are currently going through our budget process and may be cutting officer positions before the CHRP grants are awarded. Can we apply for CHRP funding to restore those positions? A: The most important part of this answer is really what you CAN’T do . . . you can’t cut your officer budget just because COPS Hiring Recovery Program funds are now available for officer hiring. First, that would be risky to your agency, because the CHRP Program is going to be very competitive and there is just no guarantee that your agency will receive CHRP funding. Secondly, that would create a potential supplanting violation that could be identified through an audit or monitoring, if it appears that the only reason your jurisdiction cut its police officer budget is because you anticipated receiving CHRP funding (you would be using CHRP funds to replace local funds that you otherwise would have spent on those officer positions). What you CAN do, however, is make your local budget decisions about police officers as if you had never heard of the CHRP Program, and then if your agency is still planning to cut officer positions, you may apply for the funds to rehire any officers who have been laid off, or to prevent lay-offs that are scheduled to occur in the future, or to hire new officers to fill vacancies that are no longer funded in your agency’s budget. Q: Does the non-supplanting requirement apply to the CHRP grant program? A: Yes, it does. The non-supplanting requirement is a legal requirement in the Public Safety and Community Policing Act, which is the COPS Office's authorizing statute. The non-supplanting requirement means COPS grant funds must be used to supplement (not replace) state, local or Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) funds that would have been dedicated toward law enforcement if federal funding had not been awarded. As it applies to your agency's CHRP grant, grantees must not reduce the level of state, local or BIA funding that would have been dedicated toward sworn officer positions as a result of receiving federal funding. Q: If our agency’s economic conditions change after receiving a CHRP grant and we want to change the hiring categories from what we identified in our CHRP application, what should our agency do? A: If your agency receives a CHRP grant and after receiving the grant, your agency needs to change the hiring category(s) it received funding under, your agency must request a post-award grant modification and must receive prior approval before spending CHRP funding. To obtain information on modifying a CHRP grant award please contact the COPS Response Center at 1-800-421-6770. Closing Remarks: Timothy Quinn, COPS Acting Director: Thanks, everyone, for providing an overview of the COPS Hiring Recovery Program. And thank you all again for listening to this podcast. For more information about the COPS Hiring Recovery Program and additional COPS resources please call the COPS Office Response Center at 800.421.6770, or visit COPS Online at www.cops.usdoj.gov.