Notice of Funding Availability for the Fiscal Year (FY) 2017 Homeless Management Information System Capacity Building Project | FR 6100 N 40

Opportunity Information: Apply for FR 6100 N 40

The Notice of Funding Availability (NOFA) for the FY 2017 Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) Capacity Building Project is a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) discretionary grant opportunity designed to strengthen how local Continuums of Care (CoCs) manage homelessness data. HUD set aside a total of $5,000,000 in competitive funding to help existing CoC Program recipients improve their HMIS operations, with the broader goal of making homelessness response systems more effective, more coordinated, and more data-driven. The opportunity is tied to federal HMIS requirements under the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act and HUDs CoC Program regulations at 24 CFR part 578, which establish expectations for how communities collect, maintain, and use data about people experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness.

HMIS, as described in the NOFA, is the information system designated by a CoC to capture and manage client and program activity data across shelters, housing programs, and service providers. In practice, this means HMIS is the backbone for recording who is being served, what services or housing interventions they receive, how outcomes change over time, and how the community can analyze performance. The NOFA emphasizes that improving HMIS is not just a technical upgrade; it is also about improving data quality, governance, and the ability to use information for strategic decision-making. HUDs framing makes it clear that communities with stronger HMIS capacity are better positioned to coordinate care, measure system performance, and target resources where they will have the most impact.

The NOFA supports several categories of eligible HMIS capacity-building activities. Funding can be used to consolidate HMIS software or databases, upgrade or customize existing HMIS functionality, improve overall data quality, and increase staff skills through training. The training focus is broad and includes HMIS governance, better data collection practices, methods for improving data quality, and data analysis that supports planning and decision-making at the system level. This mix of allowable activities reflects the reality that HMIS challenges are often both technical (systems and configuration) and operational (consistent data entry, shared standards, governance policies, and staff competency).

A major feature of this NOFA is that it explicitly funds HMIS consolidations and encourages partnerships between stronger and weaker HMIS implementations. HUD defines an HMIS consolidation as the creation of a single HMIS governed under one shared HMIS governance charter, formed by merging two or more HMIS environments that were previously governed separately. The intent is to reduce fragmentation across neighboring or related CoCs and to help CoCs that have struggled with implementation benefit from established infrastructure, policies, and expertise in other communities. The NOFA references an appendix listing CoCs with the highest HMIS needs and suggests those CoCs may be especially competitive for improvement and consolidation funding, signaling that HUD wants to prioritize communities where improvements could close significant gaps.

Eligibility is limited to existing CoC Program recipients, and the application is intended to be submitted by CoC entities with leadership responsibility for HMIS and system administration. Specifically, in Phase 1, applicants must be current CoC recipients that function as Unified Funding Agencies, collaborative applicants, or HMIS Leads. Eligible applicant organization types listed in the opportunity include state, county, and city or township governments as well as nonprofit 501(c)(3) organizations (excluding institutions of higher education). This reflects the different ways CoCs structure their leadership and HMIS administration, which can sit inside a government agency or a nonprofit depending on the community.

HUD uses a two-phase selection process that separates concept approval from final budgeting and project design. In Phase 1, eligible CoC recipients submit an application proposing either HMIS improvements or a consolidation effort. HUD reviews proposed activities for eligibility and scores applications using multiple rating factors described in the NOFA. Applicants that perform well in Phase 1 are conditionally selected and then invited into Phase 2, where they must submit a detailed budget and project proposal for HUD review and approval. The NOFA sets a 45-day window from the Phase 1 selection announcement for applicants to deliver the Phase 2 submission, which makes planning and rapid coordination important for applicants that advance.

A practical element built into the NOFA is HUDs offer of technical assistance (TA) to conditionally selected applicants during Phase 2. HUD indicates it will make a selection of TA providers available to help applicants shape budgets and project proposals that are cost-effective, feasible, necessary, and designed to maximize the positive impact of the funding. This is meant to improve the quality and consistency of final proposals and reduce the chance that communities either overbuild, under-scope, or propose approaches that cannot be executed within time or cost constraints. After Phase 2 submissions are received, HUD distributes funds based on how cost-effective, feasible, and necessary the proposal is, along with the estimated impact, meaning the final award decision is strongly tied to the realism and expected results of the detailed plan rather than the initial concept alone.

From an administrative standpoint, the opportunity is identified as Funding Opportunity Number FR 6100 N 40 under CFDA 14.261 (Community Development). The total program funding is $5,000,000, with an expected 50 awards and an award ceiling of $400,000 per grant. The posting lists a creation date of November 19, 2018, and an original closing date of January 31, 2019, with applications required to be submitted electronically by 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time on the deadline. Taken together, the funding level, number of expected awards, and per-award cap suggest HUD aimed to support a relatively broad set of CoCs with targeted capacity-building projects rather than a small number of large, multi-year system overhauls.

Overall, the NOFA is focused on strengthening the infrastructure that communities use to understand homelessness in real time, manage coordinated responses, and demonstrate outcomes. By funding software and database consolidation, system upgrades, governance and staff training, and targeted data quality improvements, HUD is pushing CoCs toward more reliable, comparable, and actionable HMIS data. The added emphasis on consolidation and cross-CoC partnerships signals a push toward efficiency and shared capacity, especially for communities where current HMIS implementations are underperforming or fragmented across multiple systems.

• The US Department of Housing and Urban Development in the community development sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Notice of Funding Availability for the Fiscal Year (FY) 2017 Homeless Management Information System Capacity Building Project" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 14.261.
• This funding opportunity was created on Nov 19, 2018.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Jan 31, 2019 Electronically submitted applications must be submitted no later than 1159 p.m., ET, on the listed application due date.. (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 $400,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 50 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: State governments, County governments, City or township governments, Nonprofits having a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education.

Apply for FR 6100 N 40

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