FY22 Innovations in Recruitment and Hiring -Community Policing Development Solicitation | O COPS 2022 171176

Opportunity Information: Apply for O COPS 2022 171176

The FY22 Innovations in Recruitment and Hiring - Community Policing Development (CPD) Solicitation is a U.S. Department of Justice COPS Office funding opportunity designed to strengthen community policing by improving how law enforcement agencies recruit and hire. The program is built around the core idea of community policing: using partnerships and practical problem-solving to address the conditions that drive public safety concerns, including violent crime, nonviolent crime, and fear of crime. Through CPD funding, the COPS Office supports projects that develop and test new approaches, identify and expand promising practices, and produce practical guidance that helps agencies adopt effective community policing strategies in real-world settings.

This opportunity is offered as a discretionary, open-competition cooperative agreement (Funding Opportunity Number: O-COPS-2022-171176; CFDA: 16.710). The COPS Office expects to make one award, with a maximum award amount (ceiling) of $400,000. The solicitation was posted May 5, 2022, and originally closed June 21, 2022. Because it is a cooperative agreement, recipients should expect more active involvement from the COPS Office than under a typical grant, especially around deliverables, review, and alignment with federal standards.

A major emphasis of the solicitation is aligning recruitment and hiring innovations with broader COPS Office priorities for FY22. Applicants are encouraged to show how their proposed work advances civil rights and racial equity, increases access to justice, supports crime victims and people impacted by the justice system, strengthens community safety, addresses evolving threats, and helps build trust between law enforcement and the communities they serve. In practice, this means proposals are expected to connect hiring and recruitment improvements to measurable community policing outcomes, not just internal staffing goals.

The program is authorized under long-standing federal public safety statutes, including the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 (as amended) and the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 (Title I, Part Q), codified at 34 U.S.C. 10381 et seq. Like most federal awards, funding is subject to the availability of appropriations and any additional legal requirements that may apply at the time of award.

Operationally, the solicitation allows applicants to submit multiple applications, but each proposed project must be submitted as a separate application. Applications must clearly identify the correct solicitation; failure to do so may cause an application to be screened out during the basic minimum requirements review. Award recipients are expected to start work immediately upon selection and notification, which signals that proposed timelines should be realistic and implementation-ready from the beginning.

Another central feature of this solicitation is its strong focus on producing usable, high-quality deliverables for the field, often described as "knowledge products" (for example, guides, reports, tools, training materials, or other forms of operational guidance). The COPS Office highlights "principles of good guidance" that these products should follow: they should be quality-driven and action-oriented (clear steps that agencies can take), evidence-based (recommendations matched to the best available research identified through systematic review), accessible (plain language and practical length for working law enforcement professionals), and memorable (designed to prompt immediate action or help practitioners navigate complex situations). Applicants are also directed to consider COPS Office performance measures while building project goals and activities, reinforcing the expectation that outcomes and impact will be tracked in a structured way.

The solicitation includes several compliance and process expectations tied to deliverables. Recipients must follow the COPS Office Curriculum Standards and Review Process Guides for any training-related products, comply with the COPS Office conference request approval process for any conference-related deliverables, and follow the COPS Office Editorial and Style Manual for written materials. For projects involving site-specific work with particular agencies or jurisdictions, letters of support from the targeted agencies are strongly encouraged, signaling that proposals should demonstrate buy-in and feasibility where on-the-ground implementation is planned.

Eligible applicants are listed broadly as "Others" with additional eligibility details referenced in the full solicitation materials, meaning eligibility is not limited only to traditional government applicants and may include certain non-governmental or specialized entities depending on the COPS Office definitions in the full text. For assistance, the solicitation directs questions to the COPS Office Response Center (800-421-6770) or AskCopsRC@usdoj.gov during standard weekday business hours (Eastern Time), excluding federal holidays.

Overall, this grant opportunity is aimed at generating practical, evidence-informed innovations in law enforcement recruitment and hiring that support the larger mission of community policing. The COPS Office is looking for projects that not only test or refine new strategies, but also convert what is learned into clear, field-ready guidance that can help agencies improve performance, reduce inconsistent practices, and build public trust while strengthening safety outcomes.

• The Department of Justice, Community Oriented Policing Services in the law, justice and legal services sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "FY22 Innovations in Recruitment and Hiring -Community Policing Development Solicitation" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 16.710.
• This funding opportunity was created on May 05, 2022.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Jun 21, 2022. (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 1 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Others (see text field entitled Additional Information on Eligibility for clarification).

Apply for O COPS 2022 171176

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