Deadline: 13-Feb-24
Applications are now open for the Legal Assistance for Victims (LAV) Grant Program to increase the availability of civil and criminal legal assistance needed to effectively aid victims (ages 11 and older) of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking by providing funds for comprehensive direct legal services to victims in legal matters relating to or arising out of that abuse or violence.
“Legal assistance” includes assistance to victims of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking in:
- family, tribal, territorial, immigration, employment, administrative agency, housing matters, campus administrative, or protection or stay away order proceedings, and other similar matters;
- criminal justice investigations, prosecutions, and post-trial matters (including sentencing, parole, and probation) that impact the victim’s safety and privacy;
- alternative dispute resolution, restorative practices, or other processes intended to promote victim safety, privacy, and autonomy; and
- post-conviction relief proceedings in state, local, Tribal, or territorial court where the conviction of a victim is related to or arising from domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, stalking, or sex trafficking.
Purpose Areas
- Pursuant to 34 U.S.C. §20121(c), funds under this program must be used for one or more of the following purposes:
- To implement, expand, and establish cooperative efforts and projects between domestic violence, dating violence, and sexual assault victim service providers and legal assistance providers to provide legal assistance for victims of domestic violence, dating violence, stalking, and sexual assault.
- To implement, expand, and establish efforts and projects to provide legal assistance for victims of domestic violence, dating violence, stalking, and sexual assault by organizations with a demonstrated history of providing direct legal or advocacy services on behalf of these victims.
- To implement, expand, and establish efforts and projects to provide competent, supervised pro bono legal assistance for victims of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, or stalking, except not more than 10 percent of grant funds awarded may be used for this purpose. (The 10 percent limit is on the funds awarded under the LAV Grant Program overall and is not specific to an individual project.)
OVW Priority Areas
- In FY 2024, OVW has four programmatic priorities. The priorities identified below are applicable to this program. Applicants are strongly encouraged, but not required, to address one or more priority areas. Applicants that state that they are addressing a priority area and meet the criteria for that priority area will be given special consideration:
- Advance equity and tribal sovereignty as essential components of ending sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, and stalking by improving outreach, services, civil and criminal justice responses, prevention, and support for survivors from historically marginalized and underserved communities, particularly those facing disproportionate rates or impacts of violence and multiple barriers to services, justice, and safety.
- Strengthen efforts to prevent and end sexual assault, including victim services and civil and criminal justice responses.
LAV Grant Program Statutory Priorities
- Improve the Availability of Legal Services for Sexual Assault Survivors
- Pursuant to 34 U.S.C. § 20121(f)(2)(C), not less than 25 percent of funds made available for the LAV Grant Program must be used to support projects focused solely or primarily on providing legal assistance to victims of sexual assault. OVW recognizes the need to place increased focus on sexual assault to address the lack of available legal assistance for survivors of sexual assault and the unique aspects of sexual assault trauma from which survivors must heal.
- Tribal Programs
- Pursuant to 34 U.S.C. § 20121(f)(2)(A), not less than three percent of funds made available for the LAV Grant Program must be used for projects that assist victims of domestic violence, dating violence, stalking, and sexual assault on lands within the jurisdiction of an Indian tribe. Note: this includes Alaska Native Villages. To receive special consideration under this statutory priority, an application must include the percentage of proposed activities that will support services to victims on tribal lands. Priority consideration under this statutory priority will be given to applications with a tribal government or tribal organization as the lead applicant
Funding Information
- This program typically makes awards in the range of $600,000.00 – $900,000.00. OVW estimates that it will make up to 45 awards for an estimated $31,800,000.00.
- The award period is 36 months for competitive applications, and 24 months for non-competitive applications.
Eligibility Criteria
- Pursuant to 34 U.S.C. § 20121(c), the following entities are eligible to apply for this program:
- Private nonprofit entities.
- Indian tribal governments, including tribal consortia.
- Tribal organizations.
- Territorial organizations. For the purposes of this solicitation, a “territorial organization” is a nonprofit, nongovernmental organization addressing domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, or stalking within a United States Territory, which includes the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Guam, American Samoa, the Virgin Islands, and the Northern Mariana Islands.
- Publicly funded organizations, not acting in a governmental capacity, such as law schools.
- Faith-Based and Community Organizations: Faith-Based and community organizations, including culturally specific organizations, tribal organizations, and population-specific organizations, that meet the eligibility requirements are eligible to receive awards under this solicitation
Ineligible
- Applications submitted by ineligible entities or that do not meet all program eligibility requirements will not be considered for funding. In addition, an application deemed deficient in one or more of the following categories may not be considered for funding:
- activities that compromise victim safety,
- out-of-scope activities,
- unallowable costs,
- pre-award risk assessment,
- completeness of application contents, and
- timeliness.
- Failure to comply fully with all applicable unique entity identifier and SAM requirements (see Application and Submission section for more information on these requirements) will result in removal from consideration.
- An applicant with past performance issues, long-standing open audits, or an open criminal investigation also may not be considered for funding.
- Note: Any nonprofit organization that holds money in offshore accounts for the purpose of avoiding paying the tax described in section 511(a) of the Internal Revenue Code is not eligible for a grant from this program.
For more information, visit Grants.gov.