The Impact of Sequestration on Federal Grant Funding
Updated: May 28, 2013
On Friday, March 1, 2013, President Obama signed an order to enact sequestration, an automatic across-the-board reduction of funds. Nearly all federal agencies will have a portion of their funds reduced. Further, on March 26, 2013 the President signed the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2013 which provides funding for the remainder of fiscal year (FY) 2013. This legislation also calls for an added rescission across agency budgets, on top of the required sequestration cuts. As the Grant Center learns about how each agency will respond, we will update this page.
U.S. Department of Education (DOE)
DOE will be hit with a 5.23 percent reduction in funding this fiscal year as a result of sequestration and a rescission. On April 25, 2013, the Department made public their operating plan for FY 2013 requested by Congress to highlight how the required budget cuts will be distributed across programs. According to the plan, nearly all grant programs are cut by an average of five percent. Popular programs to note include Promise Neighborhoods funded at $56.7 million in FY 2013, a decrease of $3.1 million compared to FY 2012; Race To The Top at $520 million, a decrease of $28.7 million; and Investing in Innovation at $144.6 million, a decrease of $7.8 million.
Update: In FY 2013, the DOE does not anticipate conducting a competition in the Promise Neighborhoods program due to limited funds available. The DOE Office of Innovation and Improvement plans to host the following six grant competitions only in FY 2013: Arts in Education Model Development and Dissemination; Charter Schools Program Non-SEA; Investing in Innovation (i3); Magent Schools Assistance Program; School Leadership Program; and Supporting Effective Educator Development (SEED). Expect the number of grants awarded in these competitions to be fewer than originally planned.
Download DOE's FY 2013 Operating Plan
Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS)
In addition to the five percent reduction in funding brought about by sequestration, IMLS will also experience a 0.2 percent rescission. IMLS plans to distribute this 5.2 percent reduction equally to each museum program, and to the IMLS research and administration accounts. For library programs, a four percent reduction will be directed towards Grants to State Library Administrative Agencies and greater reductions to the national competitive grant programs. The popular Grants for Learning Labs in Libraries and Museums program is among those cut in FY 2014. A full breakdown of how the cuts will be distributed is found here.
Read IMLS' public notice on the FY 2013 budget
National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH)
Preliminary estimates by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) indicate that sequestration will require a five percent reduction in funding for NEH during this fiscal year, which began on October 1, 2012, and will end September 30, 2013. Stations should therefore expect to see fewer new awards at lower award amounts. All prior grant acceptances and all upcoming application deadlines will stand, but the timing of future grant commitments may be delayed until overall federal budgeting decisions are determined.
Read NEH's public notice on sequestration.
National Science Foundation (NSF)
Sequestration is expected to reduce funding for NSF during this fiscal year (FY 2013) by five percent. In an effort to minimize the disruption of scientific research, a core NSF principle, the Foundation intends to award all continuing grants and cooperative agreements, as scheduled, and there will be no impact on existing NSF standard grants. The major impact will be seen in reductions to the number of new research grants and cooperative agreements awarded in FY 2013. Stations should expect to see the number of these grants decrease by 1,000 during this fiscal year.
