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Boating Infrastructure Grants

Boating Infrastructure Grants

The United States Fish and Wildlife Service's Boating Infrastructure Grant Program is a nationally advertised grant program offered through the DNR Parks and Recreation Division’s Waterways Program. This is a highly competitive grant program that provides funding for infrastructure improvements at harbors throughout the state of Michigan.

Criteria

All facilities constructed under this program must be:

  • Used only by boats 26 feet or greater in length.
  • Used by transient boaters (boaters not at their home port and staying not more than 14 consecutive days).
  • Open to the public.
  • No commercial uses or seasonal slips are allowed.
  • Continue to be used for their original stated grant purpose; and
  • Maintained throughout their useful life of the facility. Life of the facility is defined by the DNR as 20 years.

Additional DNR Waterways Program criteria:

  • Last 3 years of harbor traffic (harbor logs).
  • Last 3 years of financial summaries for the harbor.
  • All publicly owned harbors must have an approved Harbor/Marina Facilities 5-Year Recreation Plan (or amendment to the existing 5-year plan) through Grants Management that includes:
    1. A description of recreational plan elements such as facility size, marketing/events/partnering plans, dredging needs, dredging cycles (how often), dredge volume and dredge disposal location.
    2. A brief description of infrastructure replacement schedules, annual maintenance schedules and replacement or habilitation schedules of large investments like docks, buildings, etc.
    3. 5-year recreation plans must be approved by grants management staff by the February 1 deadline.

Grant funding

The USFWS acquires all funding from the Sport Fishing Restoration Account.

  • Grant funding covers up to 75% of the total approved project costs for construction of infrastructure improvement projects.
  • The remaining cost-share funds must come from the applicants based on non-federal sources.
  • Grant requests with a local match greater than 25% will get additional preference during the review and scoring stages of the grant process.

Application process 

  1. The grant application initial review and funding process begins April 1. 
    • Submit DNR Waterways BIGP application to the DNR Parks and Recreation Division, Waterways Grant Coordinator.
    • All applications must meet all Waterways Grant Program criteria as well as USFWS BIGP criteria. See Waterways Grant Program website for information. Waterways Program Grants 
  2. DNR staff conducts a technical review of the application.
  3. BIGP applications are only eligible to state governments as a first party applicant. All applications received by the DNR before April 1 are considered a third party applicant and the DNR reserves the right to refuse incomplete applications.
  4. If the application is approved to proceed, the applicant will then be asked to develop and complete a proposal and associated federal forms to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service by the end of September (exact date to be announced). Recommended and approved applicants develop a detailed application that is submitted to the USFWS before the date set by the USFWS in September. DNR assistance is required to develop an eligible application.
  5. Grant review is completed throughout the winter by the USFWS.
  6. Grant awarding is the following spring after the applications are selected and approved by the USFWS.
  7. If the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service approves the project, the applicant will then be asked to submit a full package of required documents and sign a third-party agreement with the DNR before proceeding with final engineering documents and construction.

Deadline – April 1

All applications and supporting documents are due April 1 by 5 p.m. If that date falls on a Saturday or Sunday, the deadline is the following Monday.

Authority

Annual appropriation from the Sport Fish Restoration Account of the Aquatic Resources Trust Fund pursuant to the Sport Fishing and Boating Safety Act.
Contact(s)

More info

For more information, contact Curt Wemple at 231-444-8029 or WempleC1@Michigan.gov.