Plan for Funding Changes

Obtaining funding for a prevention program is always a cause for celebration. But while the funding that you receive may be sufficient to initiate a project, and to carry out a significant portion of the project, it may not provide support for all of the project activities you would like to carry out, and it will be limited in time. For these reasons, it is useful to think of grants as “seed money” to get a project up and running. Prevention programs that choose to rely exclusively on a single source for funding are more vulnerable than programs that actively pursue funding from multiple sources. Successful programs often pursue funding from multiple sources for a single project, with funding related to different project areas or different phases.

Overall, we recommend that you incorporate planning for changes in funding at the beginning of a project. At very least, you should develop an action plan for funding cutbacks, which are inevitable. This should include actively seeking additional resources while the project is underway. If your prevention efforts involve establishing partnerships and participating in coalition building, these contacts can be wonderful sources of information regarding additional funding for the project.