Report Prepared by: Venus Rodriguez, Finance Officer
Title
SUBJECT: Adoption of Resolution to Implement a Grant Policy as Part of the City’s Administrative Policies and Procedures
REPORT IN BRIEF
Considers the adoption of a Resolution to implement a Grant Policy for the City of Merced.
RECOMMENDATION
City Council - Adopt a motion approving Resolution 2025-59, a Resolution of the City Council of the City of Merced, California, Adopting the Grant Policy.
Body
ALTERNATIVES
1. Adopt as recommended by staff; or,
2. Adopt with amendments (specify in motion); or,
3. Continue to a future meeting (specify date in motion); or,
4. Deny
AUTHORITY
City of Merced Charter, Section 200.
CITY COUNCIL PRIORITIES
As provided for in the Fiscal Year 2025-26 adopted budget.
DISCUSSION
It is the objective of the City to affirmatively seek grant funding opportunities that add to the City’s financial resources to help maintain and provide quality services and capital improvements for Merced residents and businesses. Currently, all grants are brought before the City Council for acceptance and/or appropriation, if needed, to the designated expense account for use of the grant funds. In order to expedite the process and establish consistent procedures, staff is recommending putting in place a policy to help facilitate this.
Staff researched policies that other municipalities use and created one that will decrease staff time and make the funding available for use in a timely manner. The policy essentially sets a threshold and additional criteria in which grants must come before the City Council. This will allow staff to accept, appropriate, and use smaller dollar grants as intended by the grantor without creating an administrative report that must be routed and approved before being placed on a Council agenda which can take an extended amount of time, unless the grantor requires it.
The attached Grant Policy allows for grants less than $50,000 to be approved to apply and accepted by the City Manager and appropriated to the designated expense account by the Finance Officer. All grants of $50,000 or more will still come before the Council with a resolution for acceptance and appropriation if needed.
Any future changes to the threshold dollar amount or change in criteria would require City Council approval.
Below is a table with examples of grants under $50,000 the City consistently accepts for department programs (this is not all inclusive):
|
Grantor/Program |
Police |
Fire |
Parks & Comm Svcs |
|
Justice Assistance |
$30,000-$49,000 |
|
|
|
Bulletproof Vest |
$7,000-$22,000 |
|
|
|
Alcoholic Beverage Control |
$20,000-$50,000 |
|
|
|
State Homeland Security (SHSGP) |
$3,000-$48,000 |
$3,000-$48,000 |
|
|
Listos |
|
$25,000 |
|
|
Merced County First 5 |
|
|
$1,000-$5,000 |
|
US Tennis Association |
|
|
$750 |
IMPACT ON CITY RESOURCES
The amount of staff time is expected to be greatly reduced when accepting several small sized grants that are in line with current programming.
ATTACHMENTS
1. Resolution and Grant Policy
2. Presentation