SASP training

- Speaker 1: So SASP is the first and only federal funding stream dedicated fully to sexual assault direct services. So SASP is really important in that it recognizes the complexity towards sexual assault, that it's... sexual assault is not just intimate partner violence that there are many different folks who are impacted by sexual assault, children, adult survivors of child sexual abuse, folks abused by clergy and so SASP is really the funding stream that can address sexual assault across the life span, across all ages as well. SASP funds are also designed to supplement other funding sources. So you know, in the regional meeting in some of our conversations we've really been talking about looking at the landscape in your state or territory about what sexual assault funds are happening through STOP, through VOCA, through any other discretionary funds or state allocated money. We're really looking at how SASP can really be maximized in the landscape of your own state or territory. So one of the resources that we just came to in the orientation document is the statute and I'm gonna just share that super quick so folks can see it, it is on... the RSP website and it is on, of course, if through this document you can link to it and so we're just gonna quickly just talk about what SASP can fund essentially. And so, supportive services, advocacy, intervention, accompaniment and related assistance for adult, youth and child victims, family and household members, folks collaterally affected by the victimization except for the perpetrator. SASP was also used to provide technical assistance and training around sexual assault for federal state, tribal territorial and local governments, law enforcement agencies and courts and that's through the coalition funding that we'll talk about in a minute as well as other professionals who might come into contact with survivors, non-profit organizations, faith-based organizations and other individuals. So we're gonna go back to our orientation document to talk a little bit more about that. So like in the statute there is funding for sexual assault coalitions and that funding comes directly from OVW to coalitions through the sexual assault and domestic violence coalitions program. And so that funding is for coalitions to provide training and technical assistance to local sexual assault programs and like I just said, to law enforcement courts other direct service providers and that funding cannot be used for direct services, it's really for coalitions to help support those programs who are providing direct services. And so I wanna if you see that lapse and its there, the SASP administrator should work closely with coalitions to implement the SASP funding. So we've been talking a lot about that, of course that was what our original meeting was a lot about was the collaboration between administrators and sexual assault coalitions. And you know, in some states the administrator passes through the SASP money to the coalition to administer to the local programs. And I just wanted to say a few quick things about that and if you are a pass through state we can... talk further and deeper about that individually or maybe in a specific webinar. Melissa, do you wanna talk a little bit about that? - Speaker 2: Yes, I'm assuming you're referring to the just for me to say a little bit about OVW, I was responding to a chat as you were talking. - Speaker 1: Oh, thank you. I was talking about pass throughs and some of the advice I recently heard you talk about around having really specific MOUs and the administrative cost. - Speaker 2: Yes, so we get a lot of questions from time to time about pass throughs and that function and by that we mean those state agencies that receive the SASP formula dollars take that money and give it to the coalition, to the sexual assault coalition for them then to sub-award it down to the local programs. So we're just doing a few reminders about that. Like it's really important, one, to have an MOU between your agency and the coalition if that's what you choose to do. That clearly sort of defines and lays out who is responsible for what. You know, who's gonna do the monitoring who's gonna do the making the award decisions, who's gonna issue the sub-awards things like that. And so there's very clear roles and responsibilities around that. We also, one thing I'd like to emphasize toward OVW is to figure out how you're gonna use that 5% administrative amount that's allowed under SASPs. You can take from the top if your particular, your award allocation amount you can 5% of that and use that towards costs associated with administering the SASP formula. So that would mean, you know, if you're gonna drive out somewhere and be monitoring those costs... cost for personnel, for those people, you know, for those who are responsible for overseeing the program. And so if you pass through, what we say is to have a conversation to the coalition or with the coalition about how their 5% is gonna be used. So OVW, we're not in a position to say the state agency has to pass that 5% to the coalition, however, if the state agency retains that and the coalition has a responsibility to pass through, they have cost associated with that process and so it's important to have a conversation with the coalition about what funding sources they have that are discretionary that would allow them to charge those costs appropriately that are associated with passing through and if they don't have that or even if they do that some of that 5% is shared with the coalition so they're not put in a difficult position of ultimately using funds that maybe aren't permitted to be used to oversee SASP in that way. I think those were the high points, am I missing anything Elizabeth? - Speaker 1: No I don't think so. - Speaker 2: Okay. - Speaker 1: Thank you for that. And now you're up to talk about OVW. - Speaker 2: Oh yeah. So many of you I know were at the STOP administrators meeting we just had recently in Albuquerque, so you barely know about OVW or it still may be a mystery and it's still what we do. Or maybe just how we're structured, so just a reminder that OVW is an agency within the Department of Justice. We are our own stand alone agency separate from Office of Justice Programs and separate from (). And so you would all know OJP's they're the source for the VOCA funding and a lot of other stuff. But we are separate and apart from them, our own agency and authorized through the Violence Against Women Act is when we came into being and we have lots of grant programs, SASP formula being one of them and STOP is our other formula program and our largest program within OVW. And then we have a lot of discretionary or competitive grant programs that we administer as well. We have probably about 70 or so staff within OVW, the largest amount of staff are within the program division and that's the division that administers and oversees all of our grant programs. It's where I fall and where () falls and for those of you that met Nadine () she is the Deputy Director for the program division and then the tribal division Sherry Ann who is the tribal... () the Deputy Director for the Tribal Affairs Division. Nadine and her are sort of in the hierarchy equal and Sherry Ann oversees all of the tribal grants and then Nadine oversees the rest of the associate directors. Who then are assigned the grant programs in OVW and oversee the program managers that directly work on those grant programs day to day. And that's also where the grants financial management division falls is within our programs division side. Our other sides like our policies, so that's where money falls, right? Our attorney advisors and general counsel, our director and then our budget staff that oversees OVW's budget. So that's kind of our office and then we also within all of our grant programs one of () that we also consider our grant programs are technical assistance program. So all of our other programs that we administer formula and discretionary are authorized by the Violence Against Women Act there, it's clearly described and defined with specific eligibility criteria and a scope or the purpose of those grant programs. Then our TA Program is something that OVW does because we believe in the importance of TA and that means the training you receive like from Elizabeth and resource sharing project products that are developed, tools and sort of coming to your states and meeting with you to do either in-person training or meetings that's all done through our TA program and we do that because we think that's essential to help support our grantees to continue their learning and development to get that hands on access to training and tools and sort of what's most current and being discussed in the field and to help you be successful in implementing your grant projects. So we are capped, by we I mean, OVW within the Violence Against Women Act there's a statutory cap of what percentage of our appropriated dollars to our grant programs can be taken from those grant programs and put towards TA. And generally that cap is 8% with a few exceptions here and there. So what we do then is make sure that we give TA and training to all of our grant programs, so every single one of our grant programs will have a corresponding TA provider or providers that are funded to specifically work with those grantees under that grant program. And then we also have TA around certain professions that either multi-disciplinary professions that VAWA addresses so law enforcement courts, prosecutors, victim advocates, forensic medical examiners, things like that, colleges and universities and such and then we also have the particular subject matter, so crime areas that we deal with. So stalking, dating violence, domestic violence and sexual assault. So it's a pretty big program, a comprehensive program. If you have any questions or needs around TA like just... as we're thinking about SASP or even if we're thinking about STOP the best place to start if you're just sort of grappling with like you need to know more about a particular topic or area is to start with Elizabeth and myself because then we can try to connect you with other TA providers if that's not something particular to SASP. And we also at OVW, fund the TA to TA project which is to try to help corral this very big and multi level TA project and do we have a link for that in here, Elizabeth? - Speaker 1: I don't think we do, but I can chart it. - Speaker 2: Okay. So we have, TA to TA has a calendar of events, a list of our TA providers. It's always changing and shifting and so we try to stay on top of that. So that's why I say a good place to start is with Elizabeth and I 'cause it can be a lot to kind of wade through all of that and we can be a little bit more direct in our connection (). I think that's it... TA broadly. - Speaker 1: Thanks, Mellissa. - Speaker 2: You're welcome. - Speaker 1: So we're gonna move down and talk a little bit about OVW Resources-- one document that is used a lot is the SASP FAQ. And we're actually gonna go to that FAQ after we're through this whole document and go through a couple of the questions on there. But I did wanna take us to the OVW page into the OVW Grantees page. So I'm gonna click here real quick. So here is OVW's page and it's linked in that document. and they also have a specific page for grantees, so you can see here STOP and SASP Formula Grants here, all the grants are on this page and there's different resources for you there, Solicitation Companion Guide, and the FAQ is on here as well. But we're gonna get back to that in just a moment. I'm gonna flip back. So now we're gonna talk about GMS, everyone loves GMS, right? But this is the Grants Management System and that's where grant applications are managed, it's how you apply for SASP you submit your progress reports, any Grant Adjustment Notices. So there's the link for GMS, I'm assuming most of you who are on this call have a current password and ID since we just submitted SASP applications recently. But if not or you know, your password's is not working, here's the helpline that you can call or you can email. There's several resources here about the Grants Management System, there's a webinar that you can take a look at. There's a PowerPoint here that you can link to that addresses common questions about Grant Adjustment Notification, your progress reports, your financial payment requests, sub-award reporting... So I won't get super deep into GMS, other than to point out that there are several resources here especially if you're not super familiar with it that you might wanna check out. Melissa, anything from you around GMS? - Speaker 2: Yes, so a couple of things just to alert you that are a little bit timely in terms of the grant cycle for SASP. One is that your 2017 SASP Awards have an end date that's coming up which is July 31st, 2019. So if any of you are needing and wanting to extend that which we've refferred to as no-cost extension, now is the time to be submitting that extension request. So you have between now and June 30th to be able to access GMS and to submit your extension request to me. Once we hit July 1st, and are inside that one month window before the end date we're still able to extend it, but you won't be able to from your end, from the grantee side of things, you will have to email me your request and I will have to submit it on your behalf, so it's a lot easier on me. Quite frankly if you do it as opposed to me getting a flurry of extension requests and then I have to go on and generate each one for you. So I have... and I know some of you have submitted your extension requests already, so I'm going through those and... in the order that I get them. I have a document that I have created, it's just a word document that takes you through, or I might have embedded it to a PDF, but it just shows you kind of the elements that I need in an extension request in order to have the information that's needed and approve it ahead. So I will, most of you should have it, I've sent it on a lot but... I know some of you are new and how your predecessors have filed things may not be obvious. So I'm gonna send it to Elizabeth so she can send it out to the people who are on today's call so you can get that document as well. And then the other piece is, you all, many of you... I haven't looked specifically for you on the call, but it's very common for a SASP to have maybe a 2016 that is open right now and that would have already been extended and that end date is likely gonna be July 31st of 2019, right? 'Cause most people ask for a 12 month extension your 16 awards would have typically ended in July 31st of 2018 and if you extended it a year it would now be ending July 31st of 2019. So keep an eye on that, usually then what that means is folks are ready to close out that award once the end date hits and that is the other piece to be aware of is that you actually have to go in and do several steps within GMS to close out the award and get it submitted to me as a close-out package. And you're not because I've also created a document that takes you through the steps for how to close out a SASP Award what elements are needed and what action is required for each of those elements. So we'll make sure to send that out in a follow up email as well and you'll have the orientation document that will get resent the no-cost extension guidelines and the close-out steps will come in that email for you. I think we have some chats. Oh, that's you, nothing else. Okay, so yeah. So anything else I needed to handle Elizabeth? - Speaker 1: I think that's it. - Speaker 2: Okay. - Speaker 1: And thanks for keeping an eye on the chat for me. - Speaker 2: You're welcome. - Speaker 1: So Melissa mentioned the Technical Assistance Program through OVW earlier and so I am one of the Technical Assistance Providers through the National Sexual Assault Coalition Resource Sharing Project, which is a project out of Iowa CASA. As maybe you know, I work out of my home in Tennessee, so you can tell from my accent I'm not from Iowa. And so there's several things that I can do. We host a listserve, if you're not on the listserve you can chat me or email me and I'll make sure to get you on there. And if there's other folks in your office who work on SASP a little bit or work on sexual assault funding, I'm happy to add them as well. Of course, we do meetings, and webinars and conference calls and I do a lot of individual technical assistance in a lot of connecting administrators to each other or... working with coalitions and administrators together and I do a couple of site visits per year and sometimes during those visits we do some training maybe with your staff or jointly with the coalition or for local grantees. So I'm going to send the document out in the next day or so kind of describing in more detail what a site visit from SASP can look like and I just wanna point out that I do not do monitoring for SASP, that my site visits are purely for technical assistance support, consultation, training to really help you and to learn from you. And we just had regional meetings and we're working on another meeting hopefully within the next year. And now I'm gonna turn it back to Melissa to talk about the solicitation. - Speaker 2: So you should all be really familiar with the solicitation 'cause an application was due on April 24th and I've gone through and I know all of you that are on here today have submitted an application, so that's good. I'm slowly making my way through and if I have any questions or if I see any required documents that are missing I'll be reaching out to you to ask for those, but don't worry, it's... you'll still get your award but I need to make sure the applications are complete and that I have everything before we issue you an award or if it becomes sort of a problem we usually put a hold on the funds but still send you the award and you'll just have to get me those documents before you get access to the funds. But generally we release our solicitation every year for you to apply, as the title of our program indicates, it's formula that's what determines the amount of money that you're gonna get and that formula set forth in the statute. So I think a helpful thing to understand is that the Sexual Assault Services Program is an umbrella program and within that there are several funding streams that make up the Sexual Assault Services Program. One of those funding streams is 'Formula' and that gets about... so what Congress does is they appropriate overall amount of money that goes towards the entire Sexual Assault Services Program. The funding stream that make up that are Formula, there is a tribal sexual assault services funding stream, there is a culturally specific sexual assault services program funding stream and then there is a state territorial coalitions and tribal coalitions funding stream within there. So Congress will say we're gonna give the Sexual Assault Services Program 3.5 million dollars. And then, based on that 65% of that 3.5 million goes to the Formula program. And then from there, a certain percentage goes to the tribal program, a certain percentage goes to the Sexual Assault Services Coalition and Tribal Coalition Program and then a certain percentage goes to the culturally specific program. The Tribal Sexual Assault Services, the Coalition Sexual Assault Services and the Culturally Specific are all programs in which those eligible entities which is not state agencies but those eligible ones please apply directly to OVW for that funding. So then for Formula what we do is of that 65% of the overall amount that comes then to SASP Formula, our budget staff within OVW determines what that allocation amount ends up being for each state which is based on population and then an additional amount is added based on that population. So if each state and territory gets a base amount and then they get extra added on based on their population. So not surprisingly, California and New York are sort of the largest amounts 'cause they have the largest population solo. And then that comes out every year and sometimes I know you're asking for like what are those allocation amounts, how much are we gonna get? And the only way OVW knows is if Congress makes their appropriation. So when we're in a situation where we have a continuing resolution, we don't always know what our full amount is gonna be and so until we get that full appropriation for our budget from Congress, we're kind of on hold until we get that amount and then our budget officer has to do the amounts available for every program within OVW. So you can see sometimes why it takes a little while for us to get to what your actual state amounts are gonna be. But I always have the capacity to go in before awards are issued to adjust the award amount. If you don't know at the time of your application or the wrong amount was entered in error on your part it's an easy fix, I don't want you to ever worry about that. And that's it really for the solicitation. Let me know if you have any questions but just a basic overview. - Speaker 1: Thanks Melissa. I just wanted to point out one thing that's in that section is that this was helpful in some of our meetings recently for folks to realize that there are different ways that different states or territories administer SASP. Some have their own formula, some folks have a competitive process or maybe a combination, so if you're interested in learning about how other states administer SASP just give me a call or an email and we can put together some folks to chat. So reporting... So another TA provider under OVW is the University of Southern Maine, Muskie School of Public Service which we all sectionally call Muskie. And so they develop the partner support, they collect the data, analyze it and provide it to OVW. And so most recently, they provided SASP data for every state and territory for last year, or for 17 I believe and we shared that broadly, but I can also share that again. So you can see specifically in your state numbers for SASP for all of the reports that you all turned in, that data is reflected back to you and you can look at your specific grantees and demographics and survivors that they served. So that's one of the things that Muskie does for us. They have their own page as well that's specific to SASP and I wanna show you all that real quick because it's actually pretty new. They've updated it. So as you can see here on Muskie's SASP Formula Grant Program page, there's the Subgrantee Reporting Form, there's a sample Administrators Form, there's instructions that's really helpful to center grantees and then instructions for your Administrator Report. There's a couple of... there's a training video and then some different tools here. So there's some reporting tools they've created for grantees and for you as well. So I highly recommend you go check out the SASP specific page at Muskie. - Speaker 2: I was gonna add really quick too Elizabeth that Muskie also, they do this for all of OVW grant programs, our reporting forms, they collect all of the data, so all the reports that you send in, the administrator report and your subgrantee reports all of that comes gets to Muskie and those are ones they go through and they, I say 'clean the data', they go through and they make sure if, you know, it is accurate as possible. They also have developed some access database tools for various grant programs for grantees to use to collect the statistics associated with their grant project that help them be able to then generate and complete the reporting forms that are required. They also do our reports to Congress that OVW is mandated to do on several of our grant programs. So they write and draft their report to Congress and then pull information and reflect that in the report. They pull information from our progress reporting forms, quotes from the narratives that grantees have completed, the actual quantitative data that's completed. We're always in that quantitative data reporting, cumulative data across the grant program that we're reporting on. So OVW obviously sees it and reviews it, and edits and revises. But Muskie helps us significantly in drafting and helping us get those submitted on time. So that's why it's important to get your information on time 'cause it's just a domino effect. Then it delays us giving the data to Muskie which delays then in cleaning it and verifying it and then we need that data to do the reports to Congress (). So just a little side note on that. - Speaker 1: Yeah, thanks Melissa. There's a link within this orientation document that links you to that Muskie report to Congress. Also along the lines of reports, for your special conditions, there are two types of reporting, programmatic and financial. And again we often refer to the programmatic report as Muskie report. And that's an annual report, but financial reports are quarterly. So we're gonna kind of get into that here in a sec. So two programmatic reports are the subgrantee report and your administrator report. The reporting period is the calendar year, January through December, due on March 30. So within all of your subgrantee report, you should be checking now, then making sure that they're completed and validated and before you send them on to Muskie. So you can find we already looked at the subgrantee report, you can find it on the Muskie website. There are now two ways to submit the subgrantee reports, they have a file sharing server and they send you a link every year. And it's your own specific link. And that's the new instructions on how to do that and this is the preferred method so they get it quicker. You can also mail them on a USB flash drive. And just a word of caution that's strongly recommended that if you do that that you use an express delivery service, don't use regular mail, probably have them sign for it and all that kind of thing. And then your administrator report is also a PDF form. And you download that from GMS, also due March 30th. Melissa, anything on the programmatic reports? - Speaker 2: Just a quick thing, many of you have noticed and have emailed me that you'll see on both the subgrantee and the administrator programmatic reports there is an OMB expiration date that's included on those forms and that's a requirement, it's an OMB circular requirement I think, or some other regulation where sort of to reduce paperwork and things like that and the burden on grantees by the central government. We have to go through any forms that our agency is requiring of our grantees has to go through an OMB review and a part of that they assign an expiration date for those forms. And currently I think that the SASP formula forms that are up on the website have expiration date that is past due. We're aware of that, keep using this form because OVW has been going through a review and a revision of all our progress report forms across all of our grant programs and as part of that the reviews on OMB takes longer and so my understanding is that SASP has... there'll be some changes on the form on some things that are being collected and so there'll be a revised form. You will receive email notification about it, you're gonna get trainings by Muskie on it and for STOP I know it is... they have new forms ready to go and training is already set up. And those forms will be used for the calendar year, 19 reports that are completed which are gonna be due March 30th of 2020. I suspect that same is gonna be for SASP. But you will get emails and notifications and trainings and things on that and they'll be uploaded and that's what will be on the Muskie website when you are going to get the subgrantee form it will be up there. So just a little heads-up on that. - Speaker 1: Thanks Melissa. So financial reports must be submitted via GMS no later than 30 days after the end of the quarter. Actual expenditures for the prior reporting period as well as cumulative expenditures there's a training that you can link to right here, the GMS status financial status report model for recipients and there's also a phone number for GFMD and an email if you have specific financial questions. I know that some of you may not do the financial report so you might wanna pass this information along to the folks who do. And here's just a little handy chart of due dates of the different quarters. And then Melissa already mentioned the close-out piece that she has a document that I will share but you have exactly 90 days from the award end date to complete the closeout process. This is just a little snippet from her document. So there's five different components, the final progress report, the final federal financial report, your special conditions, financial reconciliation and programmatic requirement certification. So this is... the final progress report is a required step in closing out your award. And essentially it's just your administrators report marked as final that covers the period between January 1st and the project end date on the award. And that's in GMS and you don't have to do any other kind of final progress report. And then it won't show as complete until OVW reviews and approves it. So again, I'll send some more detailed information out from Melissa about the 'Closeout' process. And then here is just another chart for some dates in the cycle the Grant Cycle of SASP. The solicitation is usually released later winter, early spring. Typically 6-8 weeks after it's released it's due, 10 days before the release. You'll need to send a copy of your funding announcement to OVW. - Speaker 2: Hey, Elizabeth. - Speaker 1: Yeah. - Speaker 2: We messed in our revisions, it's 10 days after. - Speaker 1: 10 days after. - Speaker 2: Yeah. So you all issue an RFP, right? For your sub-award process. What that RFP looks like varies greatly on the jurisdictions so sometimes it's a very formal RFP, sometimes it's an email, sometimes you don't really do one because you're non-competitive and so your coalition might do something. So if you have a formal, that's what I need, I need that attachment. You can submit that as a program office approval again, saying this is your RFP that you used for your 2018 awards. So you know, for your 2018 award from OVW, this is the solicitation that you issued. If you didn't do a competitive process, if yours is something other than a formal document you can attach to me, write that in an email and explain it to me and I can use that email and attach it and issue again on my end. And that's something that I will need as part of the Closeout process. So you might as well do it early and be done with that condition. - Speaker 1: Yeah. Thank you, I'll fix that. - Speaker 2: Yeah, no worries. Sorry, I missed it. - Speaker 1: And then this is super important to make sure your point of contact in GMS is updated. I've been asked by OVW to continually remind us about that to make sure that the correct folks are getting information straight from OVW. I have a listserve and a contact list that has a lot of different folks on it, but that is for technical assistance and purposes and so... you have to update your point of contact in GMS for OVW to know that. Even though Melissa and I probably share, you know, there's a new person here or there you have to make it official. - Speaker 2: And that's also how, you know, any automated notices from GMS like say, notices about your award is gonna be closing soon. Or something is overdue and so your funds are on hold, or if you submitted again and it gets final approval GMS sends an automated message if it's received final approval or if I have had to go in and change requested that queue 'cause I need more information, all of that is done through automated messages in GMS and so that would be sent to the point of contact that's listed in GMS. So that's also why you need to keep that updated, cause... I mean, even if I wanted to I have no control over whose audit that automated message process from GMS. I do keep my own distribution list but it's constantly changing and I sometimes miss it, so it's important to keep that updated in GMS. - Speaker 1: Yeah, thank you. And then we've talked about the reporting deadline the financial reports, the programmatic report and the closeout. So just kind of a overview of folks that can help you along the way. Questions about programmatic reports that's Muskie. And you can contact them then directly. Financial questions and reporting, Grants Financial Management Division and there's their contact. Contact Melissa for allowable activities and allowable costs and pretty much anything SASP related. GMS questions and log in, there's that helpline that can help you get access to your account. And then sexual assault specific information and training, and problem solving, things like that is me. But if you reach out to me I can always get you connected to the right person, sometimes Melissa and I do some technical assistance together, sometimes I help facilitate conversations with Muskie and so I'm always happy to get your questions and to help problem solve. So here are our links to the key resources. We've already been to some of these pages, but I wanted to... look at the FAQ real quick and we also have some, I wanna make sure we save some time for questions and I know there is a question that was sent to me previously that Melissa is going to address here in a moment. So I'm gonna pull up the FAQ. So I think one of the... a couple of things I wanted to highlight and Melissa might wanna highlight some too is around sexual assault coalitions are eligible for Formula SASP funding if they have some sort of direct services. So like a legal clinic or it's one of the most difficult things or maybe they have a hotline specific to sexual assault. You don't have to have a competitive solicitation. Convention activities are not allowable. Generally, child advocacy centers are not eligible for SASP funding because they have an age restriction in the way that they're set up and SASP has to be... programs that are funded by SASP have to serve all ages of survivors. If you have questions while we're going through this just feel free to chat them to me. All types of sexual assault can be addressed for SASP funds. Intimate partner, stranger, non-stranger, children, both male and female victims should be served. These funds cannot be used to address domestic violence. Melissa, do you wanna speak to the training piece? - Speaker 2: Yes, yes. Sorry, I didn't know if I was on mute or not. So this is one that comes up a lot is, you know, can you use SASP funds to train? And my first question to you will always be what kind of training are you wanting to do? So the key thing is that, generally a sort of a state-wide training is not something that SASP funds can support, there's been some exceptions on a very specific circumstances in the ways that the SASP money was gonna be used and you should talk to me before you do anything with that. Where it is allowed is if you have a local program who is using the SASP funding towards their salary in full or in part of a staff person who provides sexual assault services and that staff person is gonna go to the National Sexual Assault Conference or to the state coalition or territorial coalition conference that's happening in the state. Or it pays for maybe a clinical therapist and that clinical therapist wants to go to an EMDR training. That is allowed because the connection point is it allows for professional and skill development as it pertains to providing sexual assault services so that individual can do with the most current relevant, well informed support of a survivor seeking services so you can use SASP dollars to support those training costs for that SASP funded staff person. But you wanna let's say, say as a state, give money to the coalition to put towards speaker cost for their state-wide sexual assault conference you cannot use SASP funds that way. We've allowed in some circumstances maybe for those SASP funds to be used towards scholarships to SASP funded advocates to come attend that training. We have done that, but again I would say the ideal way to do it is when you make subawards consider your conversations with your coalition and feedback from your local programs and everything. Consider maybe them having do like a little travel set aside in their budget $500 even or something. And then they have the capacity to put that towards training and you can require your prior approvals here knowing it's being spent on training that relevant to their SA work. But that's usually the most direct and effective way I think of doing it. So a long way to the answer to that question, but it's been a consistent and persistent one over the years of SASP. - Speaker 1: Yes, thank Melissa. And just two quick things before we have questions. SASP can serve adult survivors of child sexual abuse. There are not limits to when this assault must have occurred or the age of victimization. And SASP funds cannot be used for forensic exams or for sexual assault nurse examiners, or for SARTs. So those are just a couple of highlights from things that we hear a lot about but the FAQ covers a lot of things that you may be wondering about SASP or ask from grantees. So we've got a little over five minutes Melissa do you wanna address the question from Andy, you wanna share it? And I can show them the chat so folks can see it as well if you wanna do that and then while Melissa is addressing this question, if you have another question, just please feel free to chat it. - Speaker 2: Yeah. So first the question that was asked ahead of this webinar was whether SASP funds can be used towards construction or minor reservation as it pertains to being compliant with the ADA, Americans with Disability Act. So maybe you need to, they're considering putting in a ramp or instead of round door knobs, lever handles, things like that. And the answer is you cannot do that with SASP funds. There are only, there's only one grant program in OVW that I'm aware of that makes an exception to that no construction, no renovations even minor ones. The only exception to that rule is the Disability Grant Program. There's a lot of federal regulations that are required before you can say what's allowed even under that grant program. So for SASP you cannot do and it's stuff even like painting can replacing carpeting, that is considered a minor renovations so you cannot do that with SASP dollars at all. So even if it is for ADA purposes, you can't use SASP funding to do that. Sorry. The question in the chat is around, it looks like there might have been some confusion about whether mental health professionals or mental health intervention is considered direct service, it is actually, so my apologies if that was confusing. So if you have either as a consultant you know, like there may be a local rape crisis center or a program that has on contract, a licenced clinical professional council, counselor or social worker, or you know, a therapist on contract you can do that with SASP funds. That's considered a direct intervention in service. So you can do that and there can also be an employee, there can be a direct employee of that center. And then you can also, if that clinician needs to go get ongoing sort of continued professional education credits or they just want their own sort of ongoing professional development, they can attend those trainings and that can help both costs associated with those trainings can be supported by SASP dollars. - Speaker 1: () are you at a coalition? - Speaker 2: Oh, I see. [inaudible] I was referring, so what's in the chat is, this person is sending I was referring to the part about trainings, well, you cant train other professionals like law enforcement or mental health professionals. So here's what I mean by that. You state agency sub-award to a local rape crisis center program. And they want to with that SASP sub-award go train clinical social workers in their community that are at other agencies on a dynamic for sexual assault, you cannot do that with SASP dollars. So and they cannot do that with law enforcement either. So that's where this training piece gets really confusing. The training dollars that SASP is gonna be able to support must be directly connected to a SASP funded advocate therapist that is an employee of their organization or a contract consultant of their organization. And the training they get has to be connected to improving, enhancing ongoing learning around sexual assault services. So hopefully that makes more sense. That's very different than we local program wanna train the general community of social workers, or clinicians in our area on sexual assault. That's a very, there's no connection directly to services in that situation. - Speaker 1: Thanks Melissa, yeah a great question. Do you want me to read this next question you can answer it Melissa? - Speaker 2: Sure. - Speaker 1: Would it be allowable to submit a grant adjustment notice to put funds into the indirect cost GMA category if we didn't request it originally in the Formula grant application? - Speaker 2: Okay. So as Formula grantees you are not required to submit a budget. So there is no GAN that you need to do to me to say you are going to maybe make adjustments to how you're using that 5% admin portion based on what you might have described in your application that you just submitted. You should keep internal documentation of how you spend that money but you don't have to submit again and get permission to make any of those changes to me. So I think that kind of answers the second part, the second question on that 5% admin, but I think what Danielle is asking is your indirect cost. If you have a federally negotiated indirect cost rate agreement, and that percentage changes or how you are using... applying that indirect cost and whatever the nexis is between that indirect cost rate and your SASP admin portion. Any changes to that indirect cost rate agreement percentage that should be submitted to OVW I think. 'Cause that should be included in your application when you submit it to us. So I might just have to have a more one on one conversation with you Danielle about what the particulars are in your situation and to figure out what's needed. "Cause I may have to go to our grants finance folks to get some more directions from them. - Speaker 1: Thanks Melissa. We're at the top of the hour are there any more questions? No, it's fine Danielle. Danielle asks can we use SASP funds to attend the 2019 National Sexual Assault Conference? Do we have to request permission in advance to attend the conferences? - Speaker 2: I don't think you will for NSAC. For some you do but typically what we've done in the past for NSAC is saying that you can use SASP funds to attend this without submitting a GAN. So you're fine with that Danielle. And there should be email correspondence that will come out from the NSAC folks with that information. If you don't see that come through it never hurts to shoot me an email and just say verifying if this is allowed and I can respond and then you can just keep that email correspondence in your grant file if that makes you feel better. - Speaker 1: Yeah, a great question. Thank you. Well, I wanna be respectful of everyone's time. Thank you for being on today and in the next day or so you'll get an email from me with a lot of things. But in the meantime please feel free to reach out if you wanna talk more about the orientation document or any other publications that we looked at I'm happy to do that and I welcome that. Melissa, anything else? - Speaker 2: If you have any other ideas of this type of meetings that would be helpful or useful to you, topics, suggestions on how to stay connected or how we can support you and just stay in communication please, you know, let us know. That's it. And thank you for your time. - Speaker 1: Yeah, thanks for your time today. Have a great afternoon. - Speaker 2: Thanks everybody.