(HONOLULU) – If you’re looking for an opportunity to serve the Lāhui, the Office of Hawaiian Affairs is currently seeking grant application reviewers for community grants that will benefit the Native Hawaiian community.
OHA’s Grants Program aims to meet the needs of the Native Hawaiian community by providing support to Hawaiʻi-based nonprofit organizations that have projects, programs and initiatives that align with achieving the outcomes of OHA’s 15-year Mana i Mauli Ola Strategic Plan.
The agency recently announced $14.9 million in grant solicitations with funding for these grants predominately coming from both state General and Public Land Trust funds.
OHA is recruiting grant application reviewers with knowledge and experience in the areas of ʻOhana, Moʻomeheu, ʻĀina, Education, Health, Housing, Economic Stability and Community Events. A timeline for grant reviews is as follows: Housing and Education: May-June; ‘Ahahui (event grants): May-June; Health and Economic Stability: May-July; ʻĀina and Moʻomeheu: June-August; ʻOhana, Iwi Kupuna, and Homestead: June-July.
“Weʻve set a deadline for prospective grant reviewers to apply for this phase of our grants work, but our goal is to set up an open recruitment because we want to develop a pool of community-based grant application reviewers,” said OHA CEO/Ka Pouhana Dr. Sylvia Hussey. “OHA will of course be implementing standard conflict of interest checks among the prospective reviewers and grant applications to maintain integrity of the process. We want to recruit as many skilled community members as possible, so that we can have a continuous, refreshed pool of application reviewers year round to be a part of this critical process.”
After conflict of interest checks, grant reviewers will be assigned individual applications by solicitation and electronically complete individual reviews of applications and scoring. Reviewers then meet as a team, with the assigned OHA Grants Program Facilitator, to discuss and finalize scores. Based on matrix scores, awarding recommendations are then submitted to the Board of Trustees for consideration and action.
Prospective candidates: should be able to provide fair and objective manaʻo; have knowledge or experience in the grant area they are assigned; possess analytical skills and the ability to use the database scoring system; have access to a computer with reliable internet; and commit to attending a one-hour training session, a two-hour team meeting and to completing approximately 10 to 20 application reviews. Preference is for grant reviewers to be of Native Hawaiian ancestry and/or possess experiences in working in and with Native Hawaiian communities.
Please note you will be ineligible to be a grant application reviewer if you are affiliated with an organization that submitted an application for any of OHA’s solicitations, or if the organization has a current OHA grant.
Deadline to apply for the first phase of reviews is 4 p.m. on Monday, May 2, 2022. Interested individuals should apply by emailing [email protected] with contact information and a short statement on why you are interested in becoming an OHA grant reviewer.
OHA offers an honorarium to all participating reviewers who volunteer their time with this project in service to the Lāhui. For more on OHA’s Grants Program including current solicitations please visit www.oha.org/grants.
