Impact of Federal Shutdown on Sponsored Projects

Federal Shutdown

Federal Government Reopens

On February 15, 2019, the President signed into law, H.J.Res. 31, the “Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2019,” Divisions A through G of the enrolled bill provide full-year funding for fiscal year (FY) 2019 through September 30, 2019, for projects and activities of all Federal Government agencies and programs not yet included in enacted appropriations bills. Division H extends certain expiring immigration authorities, provides for the budgetary treatment of the bill, and makes other technical corrections to existing law.

On January 25, 2019, the President signed into law H.J. Res. 28, the “Further Additional Continuing Appropriations Act, 2019,” which includes a short-term continuing resolution that provides fiscal year 2019 appropriations through February 15, 2019, for continuing projects and activities of the Federal Government included in the remaining seven appropriations bills.

SPO Guidance to PIs and RAs

Partial Federal Shutdown 2019: Campus Guidance

Additional Guidance

Federal Agencies

Office of Management and Budget

Grants.gov: “NOTICE: During a lapse in federal appropriations, the Grants.gov system will remain in an Operational status. Additionally, the Grants.gov Support Center will remain available to provide assistance to applicants.”

Agencies with Appropriations through September 2019 (as of February 15, 2019, partial list)

Agencies with Appropriations through September 2019 (as of December 21, 2018)

  • Department of Defense
  • Department of Education
  • Department of Energy
  • Department of Health and Human Services (includes the National Institutes of Health)
  • Department of Labor
  • Department of Veterans Affairs

Note: Information below is from the early 2018 federal shutdown.

Early 2018 - Federal Shutdown

March 23, 2018: Congress approved H.R.1625 - Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018 and the President signed the bill into law.

Research Advocate article: What Happens If the Federal Government Shuts Down? (January 19, 2018)

Office of Management and Budget

Federal Agencies

Department of Health and Human Services

National Science Foundation

NASA

Note: Information below is from the 2013–2014 federal shutdown.

2013 - Federal Government Reopens: Federal Agency Guidance

On January 17, 2014, the President signed into law H.R. 3547, the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2014, providing fiscal year 2014 appropriations for the federal government through September 30, 2014.

On October 17, 2013, the President signed into law H.R. 2775, the Continuing Appropriations Act, 2014, providing fiscal year 2014 appropriations for the federal government through January 15, 2014 (later extended through January 18, 2014). The effective time for the continuing resolution began on October 1, 2013. After the federal government shutdown ended, federal agencies provided procedures for resumption of business. Below is information received from the agencies. If you have any questions regarding specific proposals or awards, please contact your SPO Contract and Grant Officer.

Office of Management and Budget

Department of Health and Human Services

Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality

National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

National Institutes of Health

National Science Foundation

Department of Commerce

NASA

2013 - Federal Shutdown: Federal Agency Guidance

Because the Appropriations Act of 2014 was not passed by midnight on September 30, 2013, there was a lapse of appropriations for the federal agencies that support UC Berkeley’s federal grants, contracts, and cooperative agreements. Federal agencies provided written procedures for shutting down and how the lapse of appropriations affected proposals and new and existing awards. On October 17, 2013, the President signed into law H.R. 2775, the Continuing Appropriations Act, 2014, providing fiscal year 2014 appropriations for the federal government through January 15, 2014, ending the 2013 federal shutdown.

Office of Management and Budget

Department of Health and Human Services

  • Grants.gov Blog: “The Department of Health and Human Services anticipates that the Grants.gov system will remain in an operational status, but with reduced federal support staff presence, should a lapse in appropriations occur. In addition, we anticipate that the Grants.gov Contact Center will remain available, and provide assistance to callers. HHS, as Managing Partner, in collaboration with OMB and the Grants.gov Program Management Office, will keep the federal grantor community updated as to the status of the Grants.gov system as plans evolve in the event of a government shutdown.”

  • National Institutes of Health
    • Informal Notice about Potential Lapse in Appropriated Funds (September 27, 2013)
      • “If you are considering submitting an application for additional HHS federal assistance funding, please be advised that the Grants.gov system will be operational during a lapse in funding and will be accepting applications from prospective grantees. However, for NIH applications the Grants.gov system will only accept and store applications. Applications will not be processed further until such time as the authority and funding to return to normal business operations are restored.”
    • Information for the NIH Extramural Grantee Community During the Lapse of Federal Government Funding (NOT-OD-13-126) (October 1, 2013)
    • NIH-Alert letter on Current Status of NIH Extramural Operations (October 11, 2013)

    • NIH Submission at UC Berkeley: As announced, for the duration of the funding lapse, NIH strongly encourages all applicants not to submit paper or electronic grant applications to NIH through Grants.gov. However, UC Berkeley principal investigators who wish to submit NIH proposals to SPO for review during the funding lapse may do according to established campus procedures. SPO will review and provide feedback on such proposals but will not submit proposals to NIH through Grants.gov until government operations resume unless the PI requests SPO to submit his/her proposal to NIH through Grants.gov during the lapse. PIs who wish SPO to submit their NIH proposal through Grants.gov during the lapse should send the SPO Contract and Grant Officer assigned to his/her unit with an email message specifically requesting this action. This email should be submitted at the same time the proposal is routed to SPO.

  • Centers for Disease Control

National Science Foundation

  • NSF Plan for Operations During a Funding Hiatus (September 25, 2013)
  • NSF Assistance and Contract-Related Policy and Systems Issues During the Government Shutdown (also on NSF.gov)
  • NSF letter to Intergovernmental Personnel Act (IPA) Assignees
  • NSF letter on NSF Guidance regarding potential government shutdown (September 30, 2013)
    • “If the government does shutdown on Tuesday, October 1, the NSF website including FastLane and Research.gov will be unavailable. … Please be aware that, except as noted, NSF will not be available to respond to emails or phone calls during the shutdown, but will respond to your inquiries as soon as practicable after normal operations have resumed. … Grants.gov may be up and running, however, since FastLane will not be operating, proposal downloads from Grants.gov will not take place. … Once normal operations resume, NSF will issue guidance regarding any funding opportunities that have a deadline or target date that occurs during the government shutdown.”

  • NSF Submission at UC Berkeley: Because we do not know how long the shutdown will last, we do not know which upcoming NSF deadlines will ultimately be affected. Although it is very likely, based on NSF’s past practices, that deadlines occurring during and shortly after the lapse will be extended, there is no way to know for sure. Therefore, NSF PIs with proposals due in the near future need to decide if they want to wait for FastLane to be up and running again to prepare/submit an NSF proposal or if they want to use the Grants.gov option.
    Using the Grants.gov Option:
    • The first step is to in inform the SPO Contract and Grant Officer that works with the PI’s unit as soon as possible that the PI plans to create an NSF proposal through Grants.gov.
    • NSF proposals prepared as a Grants.gov submission should be routed through Phoebe just like any other Grants.gov proposal.
    • When the NSF Grants.gov proposal is submitted through Phoebe, the PI should provide the SPO analyst with a written statement/email indicating one of the following:
      1. The proposal should be held in Phoebe until after the lapse is over, or
      2. The proposal should be submitted through Grants.gov during the lapse by the current proposal deadline.
    • Please note: If an NSF proposal is submitted through Grants.gov, the Grants.gov system will not check for NSF FastLane proposal errors. This means that it would be possible for an NSF proposal to be accepted and processed by Grants.gov and still be rejected by NSF when the proposal is retrieved by FastLane.

Department of Agriculture

Department of Commerce

Department of Defense

NASA

Related information