OVW Fiscal Year 2022 Sexual Assault Services Culturally Specific Program Solicitation | O OVW 2022 171048

Opportunity Information: Apply for O OVW 2022 171048

The OVW Fiscal Year 2022 Sexual Assault Services Culturally Specific Program (SAS Culturally Specific Program) solicitation is a discretionary grant opportunity from the U.S. Department of Justice, Office on Violence Against Women (OVW). It is authorized under 34 U.S.C. 12511(c) and is listed under CFDA 16.023. The program sits within the Law, Justice, and Legal Services funding category and is designed to strengthen community-based responses to sexual assault by investing in organizations that are rooted in, and primarily serve, culturally specific communities.

The central purpose of the SAS Culturally Specific Program is to help establish, maintain, and expand sustainable services that are culturally appropriate and responsive to the real-world needs of sexual assault victims from culturally specific communities. In practice, this means OVW is looking to fund work that recognizes how culture, language, history, community context, and access barriers shape a survivor's experience and their ability to seek help. The emphasis is not only on providing services, but on ensuring those services fit the community they are meant to serve, address unique challenges, and can be sustained over time rather than operating as short-term or one-off efforts.

Eligible applicants include nonprofit organizations with 501(c)(3) status (excluding institutions of higher education) that focus primarily on culturally specific communities. Native American tribal organizations are also eligible, as long as they are not federally recognized tribal governments (in other words, tribal nonprofits or community-based tribal organizations can apply under this category). The solicitation also notes that additional eligible applicant types may apply as described in the program's eligibility clarification section. A key eligibility theme is that applicants should either have direct experience serving sexual assault survivors or, if they do not, they must partner with an organization that does have that expertise. This is meant to ensure the funded work is grounded in sound victim services practice while still being culturally anchored.

The opportunity was posted with a creation date of March 8, 2022, and had an original closing date of April 27, 2022. OVW anticipated making about 14 awards under this solicitation. The maximum award amount (award ceiling) listed is $300,000, which signals that OVW intended to fund moderately sized projects capable of producing concrete, community-level impact, such as improving access to victim advocacy, enhancing culturally specific crisis intervention, strengthening referral networks, expanding survivor-centered counseling or support options, and building organizational capacity to deliver these services in a consistent and culturally meaningful way.

The solicitation points applicants to OVW program information and performance measurement resources. Award recipients are generally expected to track progress using OVW performance measures connected to the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) Measuring Effectiveness Initiative. While the summary text does not list specific deliverables, the inclusion of these references indicates that OVW expects grant-funded activities to be measurable, tied to program goals, and reported in a way that demonstrates how services are being expanded or improved for culturally specific survivor populations. The notice also references OVW's reports to Congress on the effectiveness of VAWA grant programs, signaling that funded projects are part of a broader national effort to document and improve what works in serving survivors, especially those who face cultural, linguistic, and systemic barriers to safety and support.

• The Department of Justice, Office on Violence Against Women in the law, justice and legal services sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "OVW Fiscal Year 2022 Sexual Assault Services Culturally Specific Program Solicitation" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 16.023.
• This funding opportunity was created on Mar 08, 2022.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Apr 27, 2022. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $300,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 14 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Native American tribal organizations (other than Federally recognized tribal governments), Nonprofits having a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Others (see text field entitled Additional Information on Eligibility for clarification).

Apply for O OVW 2022 171048

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