Wednesday, February 10, 2010

more non-news from RUS

from a query asking about the status of one of my clients who has not received a due diligence notice neither a rejection letter, this is what the RUS Help Desk had to say:


BIP is in the process of sending out the round 1 notification letters. There may be a delay due to the Federal Offices in Washington being closed for the past few days.

It is my understanding that these letters will be sent via mail and email.


BIP has completed the process of sending out due diligence letters.


The helpdesk can not provide the status of individual applications.

In other words, forget about it and do like Uncle Larry said and get on your Round 2 application!

I have been out of the loop, but something that struck me when I last spoke with a RUS administrator. There are other existing programs out there where each applicant is assigned with a government agent who helps the applicant modify its application if it can to meet the needs of the government and to more easier be awarded the grant.

I would like to think something similar should have been done in this case as well.

Have three piles: 1. automatic rejects for various obvious factors and none dealing with politics, but perhaps a technical reason; 2. acceptances and 3. in-betweens. those that only need minor tweaking to get them there. I think rather than throw out ordinarily good projects that perhaps need adjustments here and there, it would be better to work with these applications to get them where they need to be.

I am certain there are dozens if not hundreds of applications that fit into this category. To have these guys start over at this point seems inefficient and I imagine frustrates many to end. I am sure many are considering throwing in the towel and simply giving up.

What to do?

What questions would you ask or what guidance are you looking for going forward?

I know I have been bombarded with emails about numerous webinars being hosted by various companies looking to capitalize on the frustration and provide guidance where they can.

No one should expect to hear from the USDA, NTIA or anyone in the federal government for awhile as it has been closed all week as folks weather these series of blizzards that have blown through this region. I know I, for one, lost power and consequently heat, from a major outage in my neighborhood. Just as we cleared the driveway and started to venture out to replenish supplies, we were hit with a third and fourth storm last night and this morning!


Whew!

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