The subgrantee’s prior performance and grade will be reviewed as a component of the subgrantee’s “demonstrated effectiveness” in providing traffic safety projects and will be considered during the awarding of projects. With funding being cut across all federal/state agencies, including the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), it is especially important that grants be awarded to those agencies that have proven to be capable of carrying out the terms and conditions of their awards and that have made a positive impact to the Traffic Safety Program.

After all proposals are scored, the TRF Planner will check the proposing agency’s performance grade for the project’s previous grant period. Agency projects that received a grade of A, B, or C will be determined to have provided sound performance in the administration of the grant during the previous grant period.

Agency projects that received a grade of D should not be awarded a grant during the current year’s RFP process unless it is determined to be in the best interest of TRF-BTS to do so. In these cases, the agency will be considered a “high risk” subgrantee and will be expected to demonstrate improved performance during the first three months of the grant period.

Agency projects that received a grade of F should not be funded through the current RFP cycle.

Agency project grades for the prior year can also be used in determining grant awards in certain circumstances. For instance, if two proposals competing for a similar project have an identical score (through the TRF RFP scoring process) and funding is limited, the agencies’ prior year’s performance grades may be used to determine the agency that is to be funded. A grade of A will beat a grade of B, a grade of B will top a grade of C, etc. If the (letter) grades of the agencies are the same, then TRF-BTS staff will view the numerical grade (created by eGrants) to determine the award.