Security grants for community centers, JCCs, museums & cultural institutions

The federal Nonprofit Security Grant Program is available in every state through the state's homeland security agency (the SAA). It comes in two streams, and which one you use depends on whether your site sits inside a FEMA-designated high-risk urban area — each state page below lists the metros that count.

What the federal notice means for community centers and museums

• A community center, JCC or museum applies as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and should attach its IRS determination letter — the federal notice's no-letter exemption is written for houses of worship, and other nonprofits are told to attach theirs.
• You apply through your state's homeland security agency (the SAA), not directly to FEMA — so the SAA's own page, not FEMA's, is where the application actually happens.
• Contracted security personnel are an allowable cost and can make up the whole award, but grant funds cannot buy the guards' own equipment.
• Cybersecurity measures are allowable alongside physical security, which matters for a center or museum that keeps membership, donor or visitor data.
• An organization with a main center and a satellite needs a separate vulnerability or risk assessment for each site — a single shared assessment can get the whole application rejected.
• Construction or renovation — worth knowing for a museum or cultural institution in an older building — triggers FEMA's Environmental and Historic Preservation (EHP) review, and work cannot begin until FEMA approves it — so build in extra lead time.

Step by step: how to apply for the NSGP →

The NSGP-UA and NSGP-S allowable-cost list is the same in every state, with a note on how each line tends to apply to community centers and museums. Lines without a note are allowable too — they just have no audience-specific angle.

• Target hardening (cameras, doors, fences, alarms, lighting)Cameras, access control and reinforced doors fit a facility with several entrances, public programs and after-hours rentals.
• Contracted security personnel (can be up to 100% of the award, but grant funds can't buy their equipment)Paid security staffing suits a building that is open to the public for long hours, with visitors who are not members.
• Security planningSecurity planning and a risk assessment give a multi-use facility one plan covering every program under its roof.
• Training (attendance fees only)Training and exercises prepare front-desk staff, program leaders and volunteers to respond to an incident.
• Exercises
• Cybersecurity measuresCybersecurity appears on this list — check the line's own limits — and matters for a center or museum that keeps membership, donor or ticketing data.
• Construction and renovationConstruction or renovation can pay for entry redesign or protective glazing — worth checking for a museum in an older building, where historic-preservation review may apply.
• Management & administration (up to 5% of the award)

Each of the following has a program of its own with a rule that bears on community centers and museums — who qualifies, which documents to attach, what the money can buy or a carve-out to know about. Its page checks every program there, state and federal, with the documents to gather and a realistic next step.

Each label summarizes the program's own materials; the state page quotes the rule behind it and names the agency to confirm it with before you apply.

For each of the following, this catalog lists no security-grant program of its own, so for community centers and museums the federal NSGP through the homeland security agency (the SAA) is the route. Its page names that agency and the urban areas where the NSGP-UA stream applies.

Each of the following also has a program of its own, but nothing in this catalog's summary of it speaks to community centers and museums one way or the other — the program's general nonprofit rules apply as written, and its page lists the program alongside the federal NSGP.