Compete for federal dollars, and win.
BUILD/RAISE, transit capital, and discretionary grant positioning from someone who helped write the playbook.
Grants are won long before the application is due.
- Readiness review: project eligibility, match, and NEPA status.
- Benefit-cost framing that lets multimodal projects compete (Erika's explainer).
- Letters of support from a coalition that includes unexpected voices.
- Congressional engagement with your delegation before, during, and after award.
Grant strategy works best alongside our full-service engagement campaigns and stakeholder interviewing. See how it worked for Champaign-Urbana MTD's TIGER grant.
"The MCORE project is a great example of how direct federal investment to communities can incentivize local partnerships and fund smart, homegrown transportation projects to solve locally identified issues."Erika Young, "Copy this strategy: CUMTD wins TIGER grant," Transportation for America, 2016
Free grant-readiness checklist
Leave your email and Erika will send the 12-point checklist she uses with agency clients.
Questions, answered.
What is the BUILD (formerly TIGER and RAISE) grant program?
BUILD is a U.S. Department of Transportation discretionary grant program that funds road, rail, transit, port, and active-transportation projects with significant local or regional impact. It was previously called TIGER and then RAISE.
How can a city improve its chances of winning a federal transportation grant?
Start early: confirm eligibility, local match, and environmental review status; build a benefit-cost analysis that captures all project benefits; gather letters of support from a broad coalition including businesses; and brief the congressional delegation before and after submission.
Does ELY Public Affairs write grant applications?
ELY Public Affairs focuses on grant strategy: readiness review, benefit-cost framing, coalition letters of support, and congressional engagement. It can work alongside an agency's technical grant writer or engineering consultant.
Have a thorny issue that needs support?
Book a free, 30-minute strategy call. Erika will look at your policy goal, your audience, and your timeline, and tell you plainly what it will take.