Re: HRSA Training Grants & Cost Sharing Dolce, Peter J 09 Dec 2004 09:21 EST
We have the same problems here, (we just submitted two such applications) and I suspect that many other schools do, despite the PI's statements. It's also not unusual for there to be a disconnect between a sponsor's program officers and its grants management officers, and between the sponsor and auditors. I haven't pursued this matter aggressively, but my postaward counterpart has become increasingly concerned over the past two years or so about such applications, for all the reasons you state. One solution might be to accept the idea that HRSA wants to know about institutional resources and write a section into the budget justification or elsewhere that describes these without attaching a price to them, analogous to the Resources section of an NIH application. This is written without HRSA instructions before me--I seem to recall that one of their budget forms has a line for the applicant's contribution in dollars, but that could be addressed with a footnote referring to the instructions--i.e. to the statement that contributions from the applicant are not required. Am eager to hear what others say about this. Peter J. Dolce, Ph.D., Director Office of Research Support Services Meharry Medical College 1005 D. B. Todd Boulevard Nashville, TN 37208 Phone 615 327 6703 Fax 615 327 6716 -----Original Message----- From: Research Administration List [mailto:xxxxxx@HRINET.ORG] On Behalf Of Smiley, Rick Sent: Thursday, December 02, 2004 9:58 AM To: xxxxxx@HRINET.ORG Subject: [RESADM-L] HRSA Training Grants & Cost Sharing I have encountered an issue into which I would like some insight. We submit training grant proposals to HRSA from the Schools in our Medical Sciences Division. In these proposals, our PIs regularly include large amounts of detailed "In-Kind Contributions" in the narrative (mostly the salaries of teaching and clinical faculty). These add up to large sums - over $250,000 in the most recent proposal. Our investigators do this in close consultation with HRSA program officers and feel strongly that HRSA expects to see this sort of detail in the proposal. It must be noted that these Schools have been very successful in winning these grants, so they are clearly doing a great many things right and well. The investigators also argue strongly that HRSA does not consider these representations to constitute committed cost-sharing and note that the program guidance specifically states that cost-sharing is not required (they recognize that the latter statement does not prove the former). Rather, they argue that HRSA wishes to see the level of institutional resources available to the program, while not requiring they be dedicated solely to the grant objectives. The firm assertions that these resources will be provided, coupled with the detail in which they are listed, raises a red flag here in OSP - this seems to us to be indistinguishable from committed cost sharing. Regardless of what HRSA may think or say, we think an auditor would be expecting, based upon any number of rationales, effort reporting and other documentation of the expenditures so boldly detailed in the proposal. We will skip the implications of this amount of voluntary cost sharing for our F&A negotiations. Our PI notes that she has attempted to raise this issue in off-campus professional meetings and has found no other University where OSP considers this an issue (with regard to HRSA training grants). Does anyone have any insight into this? I am especially interested in anyone with experience with HRSA training grants specifically. Riddick S. Smiley Grant & Contract Officer Office of Sponsored Programs Greenville Centre, Rm 2906 East Carolina University Greenville, NC 27858-4353 (252) 328-9539 office (252) 328-4363 fax xxxxxx@mail.ecu.edu http://www.research2.ecu.edu/osp/ ====================================================================== Instructions on how to use the RESADM-L Mailing List, including subscription information and a web-searchable archive, are available via our web site at http://www.hrinet.org (click on "Listserv Lists") ====================================================================== ====================================================================== Instructions on how to use the RESADM-L Mailing List, including subscription information and a web-searchable archive, are available via our web site at http://www.hrinet.org (click on "Listserv Lists") ======================================================================