Yesterday our partners at HUD’s Office for International and Philanthropic Innovation announced a $10 million competition for the Strong Cities Strong Communities (SC2) Initiative. We encourage you to take a look at the letter below and contact partnership@cof.org if you have any questions.

Dear Colleagues,

HUD is pleased to announce its Notice of Funding Availability (NOFA) for the Strong Cities Strong Communities National Resource Network (SC2 Network). As many of you may know, HUD has been an integral partner of the Obama Administration’s Strong Cities Strong Communities (SC2) Initiative, a federal interagency initiative focused on improving technical assistance and capacity support to cities facing long-term economic challenges. The SC2 Network is one of SC2’s four key components.

The NOFA competes out approximately $10 million in funding to be awarded to only one entity or a consortium to manage and implement the SC2 Network. Entities that are eligible to apply are nonprofit organizations, foundations, anchor institutions, for-profit companies, or a consortium of these entities with demonstrated ability to raise philanthropic support. Anchor institutions are defined as entities that represent educational institutions, or regional and national organizations that support economic drivers such as in housing, infrastructure, and/or economic and workforce development.

The SC2 Network is a capacity building program to assist the nation’s most distressed cities, and will function as a central portal to connect such places to national and local experts with wide-ranging expertise and skills. It will align federal resources as well as coordinate the separate and wide-ranging pools of technical experts and assistance programs with the needs of each community to help them make more effective investments at the local level. The objectives of the programs are as follows:

• Provide communities facing long-term economic challenges with easily accessible and comprehensive technical assistance that can help retool them for future economic growth;
• Build capacity in distressed communities by connecting them with philanthropic organizations, non profits, public and private sector entities to facilitate long-term partnerships and economic investments;
• Develop a set of best practices and policy recommendations that can be disseminated and shared across all communities facing similar economic challenges;
• Improve the alignment of federal resources as well as strengthen federal and local partnerships.

Applicants must apply by January 28, 2012. For more information on the SC2 Network, as well as how to apply, interested applicants should visit: https://apply07.grants.gov/apply/forms_apps_idx.html. At this website, applicants will be prompted to enter an identifier code for the SC2 Network. To get the SC2 Network NOFA, along with the application materials, applicants should enter 14.534 under the heading for “CFDA Number.”

Last year, HUD announced the competition of another SC2 component—the Strong Cities Strong Communities Fellowship Program which has deployed 17 fellows across seven SC2 pilot cites. Today, HUD is excited to announce this NOFA as part of its continued and expanding efforts in SC2, a critical initiative that supports our nation’s most distressed communities.

Please forward to your networks and let us know if you have any questions.

Stewart Sarkozy-Banoczy

Director

Office for International and Philanthropic Innovation (IPI)

Office of Policy Development & Research

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development