All interested applicants must complete the grant screening form including project contact, which track they plan to apply for, and a brief description of the planned project. After that is reviewed and approved to ensure it is the correct track(s), a link to the portal will be emailed. The link to the applicant CANNOT be shared, each link is unique for the applicant.
Yes, your organization may be approved to apply for both tracks B and C. If that is the case, the point of contact will receive 2 emails with links to the portal, but you will only need to redeem one. You will see applications for both tracks in the portal when you log-in. You will use the same login for them both. You must complete and submit EACH of the applications in your portal to be reviewed. Any incomplete or unsubmitted partial applications will not be scored. We would encourage writing your responses in a Word document first so that information that will remain the same in both applications can be easily copy and pasted. Please make sure to make changes to the information so that it applies to the project approved for each track.
No. If there are contracts already in place, these funds cannot be used to supplant an existing budget item for an organization.
No. Applicants cannot apply for funding to meet their operation requirements such as cost of space, staff wages, or existing licensures and subscriptions.
Yes! Track B is specifically for service organizations to improve their web and print resources to raise awareness for community members, organizations, and employers about the services and programs that your agency can provide. Then Employers can apply for Track A to contract with organizations that can help serve their employees and prepare for hiring foreign-born individuals or for Track C organizations that can contract services to plan and implement community events that foster connectedness and cultural understanding.
No. Legal fees are federally required to be paid for by employer sponsors or for certain Visa types, the employer and candidate can negotiate which party will be responsible for certain fees. Recruitment fees are not eligible. There were several factors considered for this chief among them being that recruitment fees can vary extensively by recruitment agency, candidate qualifications, and case based complexities that are unknown in advance, fees are often paid before or during the timeline of a Visa being applied for and the individual traveling to the U.S- a period of time that can take months or years to complete; It is impossible to know which jobs or employers will be able to fill jobs during a biennium using Visas. The ability to measure outcomes is vital to ongoing or future funding to support employers. The Office of Legal Immigration is committed to facilitating opportunities for employers in North Dakota to access pools of qualified candidates in the U.S. and using existing Visa pathways in partnership with federal agencies to help reduce recruitment costs and timelines for skilled and/or seasonal workers.
We understand that funding operations is critical for continuation of services and programming. This is a one-time pilot grant program that cannot be used to sustain operations. The goal of this funding is to help create a sustainable funding model for non-profit service organizations. The pilot grant will provide funding for service organizations to enhance awareness to communities and employers of the services they can provide and then funding for employers to contract for those services. This will allow employers to support their employees, improve hiring and retention of New American and immigrant workers, as well as training of existing staff and helping to implement culturally understanding practices that improve retention.
Yes, employers can indicate more than one contractor, especially if they recruit from, hire, or currently employ people that represent different cultures and languages, where many service organizations are geared toward specific cultural and linguistic communities.
Track A applicants cannot apply for funding to use for existing contracts. If an employer is already contracting services with one entity but have additional needs, they could request funding to enhance or expand an existing contract OR contracting with another entity based on their workforce and worksite needs.
3 letters of support are required. These are letters from partners and community or faith organizations that agree that the activity being proposed meets a need. They need to be uploaded with the grant application.
Bids, proposals, and estimates of costs used to create the budget are required. This is a way to show how the grant funding request is being calculated by the applicant. We understand that some costs may change during the project but the award amounts will not.