Price differences? Help grant guru's

[Limeforever]

When we put in for our grant, we priced turnout gear at roughly $1000.oo per set for coat and pants. Now that we are ready to purchase, the sets are looking at about $1250.00 per coat and pants. We have saved enough from other purchases to cover this additional cost, but do I have to put in for and amendment or what? This will not be a new item, only a change of cost. We had a couple of other items that were over the initial price, but only by a couple hundred dollars, talked to FEMA and they said it was fine, that things like this were expected, just to make note of it when we did our closeout.
Grant guru's any input on this?

[toddmcbr]

http://forums.firehouse.com/showthread.php?t=75353

Read through that, I think most of your questions will be answered.

[ktb9780]

I have this question posed to my contacts in Washington DC. I know they will answer it on Monday and when he clarifies their postion I will post what they told me.

There appears to be some differences of opinion from one Fire Program Specialist to the next on this and Brian, Alana and I do not want to promulgate incorrect information to you all. We all agreed on this in principle that as long as all the items were purchased that the grant said you were going to purchase ,then price did not matter but, scRescue got a conflicting answer form the FPS he spoke to so I have gone over that FPS head to the next rung up the ladder in an attempt to clarify this. Have a little patience here and we will get a definitive answer and post the correct procedure in here later this week. Keep checking back.

[BC79er_OLDDELETE]

I threw it out in a different DHS direction also, just to make sure that all are on the same page. We all thought that individual line item prices weren't a big deal as long as the package ended up being what was awarded. I always recommend a 3-5% increase over what you were quoted to make sure you aren't short at the end of the race. It's not enough to knock you out of any running, so the increased price won't matter, but it will hopefully save some rearranging if awarded.

- Brian

[Limeforever]

Kurt, Brian
I appreciate all the help, and I most definatly will be checking back. I have discussed this with several different people at FEMA, and they all seem to give a different interpretation. Even before the disasters hit and all it seems like it took an eternity to get a response from FEMA on nay of our questions. I waited for two weeks on an amendment before I ever got an answer.

[dixiechicknc]

Also, one additional side note of interest, PRINT out your award package ( by logging into to the application, then click on VIEW AWARD PACKAGE, then on that screen, you will see an additional link to VIEW AWARD PACKAGE, click on that, then print it out).

I just printed out our departments SAFER package and in it the package Article VI BUDGET CHANGES discusses changes to individual line item requests. It states that GENERALLY they are permitted...

Let me do some research on our '05 and '04 awards to see what the terminology is in there. I've never thought to look in those packages for the Budget Change Info. Was just going over some SAFER guidelines and stumbled onto this...will post when I see the others.

[dixiechicknc]

Here's the wordking from the '05 Award until Article VI BUDGET CHANGES:

Article VI - Budget Changes - 2005 AFG

Generally, changes in the budget-line items are permitted, as long as the original program narrative is accomplished. The only exception to this provision is for grants where the Federal share is in excess of $100,000.00. In grants where the Federal share exceeds $100,000.00, the budgeted line items can be changed, but if the cumulative changes exceed ten (10) percent of the total budget, Changes must be pre-approved.


It appears to be the same from '04. SAFER is same here it is.

Article VI - Budget Changes (SAFER - 2005)

Generally, changes in the budget-line items are permitted, as long as the original program narrative is accomplished. The only exception to this provision is for grants where the Federal share is in excess of $100,000.00. In grants where the Federal share exceeds $100,000.00, the budgeted line items can be changed, but if the cumulative changes exceed ten (10) percent of the total budget, Changes must be pre-approved.