National Communication System for Runaway and Homeless Youth Program

Background
The Administration for Children and Families (ACF), Administration on Children, Youth and Families (ACYF), Family and Youth Services Bureau (FYSB) will award one cooperative agreement on a competitive basis for a period of three years to operate the National Communication System (NCS) for Runaway and Homeless Youth Program. The NCS Program is a dedicated toll-free, U.S. national communication system that provides information, referral services, crisis intervention, prevention approaches, and other supportive services to vulnerable, at-risk, and runaway and homeless youth and their families or legal guardians. The purpose of the NCS is to prevent youth from running away and becoming homeless, link youth with a family member or guardian, and/or an available resource that can provide and/or assist the youth in acquiring needed services, and increase prevention education to reduce runaway incidents and youth homelessness.

Grant Details
The NCS Program recipient is expected to carry out components such as operating a hotline (telephone and online services), maintaining a referral database, implementing an NCS Web portal, providing prevention and community education, ensuring the well-being of vulnerable children and youth by addressing trauma, experiences, developmental tasks, coping strategies, protective factors, positive youth development (PYD), ensuring equity in services for all youth including underserved populations such as LGBTQIA2S+ youth and those of color.

The recipient must also have capacities to operate at a nationwide level including Native American tribes and Alaska Native villages. Reporting requirements include collecting data on calls received, answered, missed; chats and texts received; visits to the NCS web portal; non-identifying information about callers or web portal users; assistance provided by the NCS; information on calls received from youth in crisis.

Deliverables include progress reports, final report outlining project implementation with challenges/successes/lessons learned, participation in RHY Program Network meetings. The recipient may transfer substantive programmatic work through subawards but must maintain a substantive role in the project.

Eligibility Requirements
The grant is open for application by eligible applicants as specified in Section III.1. Eligible Applicants of the NOFO. Subrecipients must meet eligibility requirements identified in the NOFO Section III.1. Eligible Applicants.

Period of Performance
The grant has a 36-month project period with three 12-month budget periods starting on 09/29/2023.

Grant Value
$1,800,000 is the estimated total funding for one cooperative agreement with an award ceiling of $1,800,000 per budget period and an award floor of $1,000,000 per budget period.

Place of Performance
The NCS Program recipient must have capacities to operate at a nationwide level including Native American tribes and Alaska Native villages as well as the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, Northern Mariana Islands.