Grants Management Application for Tribal Government
Case StudyConfederated Tribes of Grand Ronde
Reimagining Grants Management for the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde
The Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde Community is a federally-recognized tribe comprised of over 30 tribes and bands from western Oregon, northern California, and southwest Washington. The Tribe is governed by a nine-member council, who is committed to preserving the cultures and traditions of 6,000 enrolled members.
Challenge
The Grants Department at the Tribe was relying on a patchwork of Excel spreadsheets, email threads, and disconnected documents to manage the Tribe’s grants. These legacy processes made it difficult to track grant statuses, manage documentation, and respond to internal and external reporting requests in a timely manner.
Compounding the challenge, the Tribe’s financial system lacked a dedicated grants management module, and the sudden loss of a previous staff member left behind thousands of unsorted files and emails. Even basic questions such as ‘What grants are active this year?’ required weeks of investigation and still yielded incomplete answers.
“There’s been plenty of times where we’ve just had to shrug our shoulders and say, “I don’t know”, because having to sift through that information would have been too difficult,” commented Wendy Sparks, Grants Manager for the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde.
When it came time to evaluate third-party systems to help modernize the grants management process, most proved to be too costly and rigid for the specific requirements of the Tribe.
“Other systems are not customizable. They can’t take a tribe’s processes and then consider how to build a system around them…I will say so far, this solution has been able to meet 100% of our needs. We’re already planning Phase Two because we know what else it can do.”
Solution
After learning of the Grants Department’s struggles, the Tribe’s applications administrator referred them to Arctic IT, who had previously implemented other Power Apps applications for the Tribe. Sparks, who had prior work experience with Power Apps, knew the potential this platform brings for building a new grants management application. “We didn’t want a system that had inherent workarounds from day one. What happens with Power Apps is that it grows with us. We understand how the system works and how we need it to grow.”
In collaboration with the grants team, Arctic IT gathered the Tribe’s unique requirements and mapped out the grants management application on Power Apps. The system was carefully configured to align with the tribe’s internal grant processes – from application planning and submission through implementation and reporting.
The new solution consolidated all grant-related information into a secure and centralized, cloud-based environment. Key features include:
- Manages the full grant lifecycle: opportunity to pursue, application submission, award/deny status, spend, and grant closure or annual recertification
- Real-time tracking of grant status, deadlines and funding sources/allocation
- Automated workflows for document routing, notifications, and milestone tracking
- Built-in timelines and notes, replacing siloed OneNote and Word documents, to keep important details organized
- Secure document storage within the grant record
- Configurable fields and custom views that reflect tribal-specific processes and workflows
- Enhanced reporting capabilities through ‘advanced find’ search, enabling staff to instantly generate summaries by department, fiscal year, or grant type
Dana Morfin, the Grant Department’s first full-time staff member, shared, “One of the things that’s so awesome about this system is the ability to create automations. We have a huge three-step process that we go through for grants. It automatically says, ‘I’m going to start making this form for you, generate all these emails, these kick-off forms, et cetera.’ It’s so nice because for us, it’s truly transforming how we operate.”
Results
The new grants management application provides better data integrity for the Grants Department, which helps improve their ability to apply for grants in the future and builds trust with Tribal Council and members. Staff can easily view active grants and their funding sources at the click of a button. Reporting that used to take days to consolidate now takes seconds.
The solution implementation was completed ahead of schedule and under budget. The application’s scalable and configurable design allows it to grow alongside the department’s evolving needs.
“Once our team introduced us to Arctic IT, it was very clear that Arctic had worked with tribes before, and so they understood how tribes functioned. It was also very clear that they had lots of experience with Power Apps, so they were able to translate our lofty ideas into what Power Apps is able to do. I think the key to success was having Arctic and all of the background they bring to this process. I don’t think we would have had that experience had we not gone with a consultant that was deeply aware of the specific needs of tribes,” said Sparks.
Morfin added, “I’ve integrated a lot of systems here at the Tribe, and I can honestly say I’ve never worked with a team as amazing as Arctic IT. All the way from doing scoping to the configuration. They totally respected our timeframe, and it was truly a collaborative effort.”
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