BJA FY 23 Supporting Small, Rural, and Tribal Law Enforcement Agency Body-Worn Camera Policy and Implementation Program | O BJA 2023 171563

Opportunity Information: Apply for O BJA 2023 171563

The BJA FY 23 Supporting Small, Rural, and Tribal Law Enforcement Agency Body-Worn Camera Policy and Implementation Program is a U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs (OJP) solicitation administered by the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) aimed at strengthening trust and accountability in policing through body-worn camera (BWC) adoption and improvement. The opportunity is built around OJP priorities that emphasize protecting civil rights, advancing racial equity, improving access to justice, supporting victims and justice-involved individuals, strengthening community safety, and responding to evolving public safety threats. In practical terms, the program is meant to help smaller and often resource-limited agencies implement BWC programs in a way that is thoughtful, policy-driven, and sustainable rather than piecemeal.

This grant is not primarily designed to fund individual police departments directly. Instead, BJA intends to make one award to a single organization that will act as the administrator of a competitive microgrant program. That organization will be responsible for creating the structure and rules for the microgrants, running a competitive selection process, and then making awards to small, rural, and tribal law enforcement agencies that want to start a BWC program or expand an existing one. The microgrant approach is intended to lower barriers for agencies that may not have grant-writing capacity, specialized procurement expertise, or internal policy resources, while still ensuring funds are distributed through a competitive and accountable process.

A second major component of the award is training and technical assistance (TTA). The funded organization must provide comprehensive TTA specifically to the agencies that receive microgrants from that same organization. This means the awardee is expected to support grantees beyond simply passing through funds. The TTA role typically implies hands-on help with the practical and policy issues that determine whether BWCs actually improve transparency and public confidence, such as developing or refining camera use policies, aligning practices with constitutional and civil rights considerations, handling public records and discovery obligations, building community-facing communication strategies, and establishing internal procedures for supervision, auditing, retention, and accountability. In many BWC efforts, the policy and implementation details are where programs succeed or fail, so this solicitation explicitly pairs funding with implementation support.

The opportunity is a discretionary cooperative agreement under CFDA 16.835 in the Law, Justice and Legal Services category. A cooperative agreement generally indicates that BJA expects to have substantial involvement in the project’s direction, coordination, or oversight compared to a standard grant, which matters because the selected organization will likely collaborate closely with BJA on the design of the microgrant competition, performance expectations, and reporting. The funding opportunity number is O-BJA-2023-171563. The solicitation was created on February 6, 2023, with an original closing date of April 4, 2023.

Funding is structured around a single, large award with an award ceiling of $8,000,000 and an expected number of awards of 1. That structure reinforces that BJA is selecting one lead entity to design the microgrant program, manage subawards, and deliver TTA at scale. Because only one organization is expected to be funded, applicants would need to demonstrate strong operational capacity, credible experience supporting law enforcement implementation efforts, sound financial and subrecipient monitoring systems, and the ability to deliver consistent, high-quality guidance to geographically dispersed small, rural, and tribal agencies.

Eligible applicants include nonprofits with 501(c)(3) status (other than institutions of higher education), nonprofits without 501(c)(3) status (also other than institutions of higher education), and other entities as described in the solicitation’s additional eligibility information. In other words, the target applicants are organizations capable of serving as an intermediary and technical assistance provider, not the individual law enforcement agencies that will ultimately receive microgrants. The overall intent is to increase the reach and quality of BWC programs in communities that often have fewer resources, while reinforcing national priorities around constitutional policing, equity, transparency, and community trust.

• The Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance in the law, justice and legal services sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "BJA FY 23 Supporting Small, Rural, and Tribal Law Enforcement Agency Body-Worn Camera Policy and Implementation Program" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 16.835.
• This funding opportunity was created on Feb 06, 2023.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Apr 04, 2023. (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 $8,000,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 1 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Nonprofits having a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Nonprofits that do not have a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Others (see text field entitled Additional Information on Eligibility for clarification).

Apply for O BJA 2023 171563

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