Assistance program
Emergency Food and Shelter National Board Program
$2.2 Billion committed in FY2018–FY2026
- Agency
- Federal Emergency Management Agency, Homeland Security, Department of
- Assistance
- Project Grants
- CFDA number
- 97.024
- What it does
- This program does not accept unsolicited proposals; the only eligible applicant to FEMA for EFSP funds is the Emergency Food and Shelter Program National Board. EFSP funding is sub-awarded by the National Board to supplement the on-going efforts of local service organizations to provide emergency food and shelter to those in need. The goal and objective of the program is to assist those experiencing, or at risk of experiencing, hunger and/or homelessness. Program funds support the National Preparedness Goal (NPG) by complementing actions undertaken to achieve an “all-of-Nation preparedness approach that optimizes the use of available resources.†When a disaster strikes, it is often the poor or those with economic vulnerabilities who suffer the most. By providing emergency economic assistance that keeps people off the streets, from being evicted from their homes, or with groceries to prevent hunger, the EFSP prepares a population that could otherwise be even more adversely impacted by a disaster situation and mitigates potential burdens imposed on recovery efforts to assist such people. For additional details on the NPG, please refer to http://www.fema.gov/pdf/prepared/npg.pdf. FYs 2019, 2021, 2022, and 2023 supplemental program funding was provided to EFSP for humanitarian relief, such as shelter and other services to migrant families and individuals encountered by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
- Who benefits
- The only eligible applicant to FEMA for EFSP funds is the Emergency Food and Shelter Program National Board. EFSP funding is sub-awarded by the National Board to supplement the on-going efforts of local service organizations to provide emergency food and shelter to those in need. The National Board determines which jurisdictions have the highest need for EFSP funding by using a formula based on unemployment and poverty statistics to determine allocations to counties and cities. Service agencies receiving funds from the National Board, via sub-award made by the community’s Local Board, must use these funds to supplement, not replace, their current efforts as this program allows them to extend and expand upon existing services. Humanitarian relief funding is provided to eligible organizations providing shelter, food, transportation, basic heath and first aid (including COVID-19 testing) and other supportive services to migrant families and individuals encountered by DHS.
Committed by fiscal year
* FY2026 is year-to-date — the fiscal year is still in progress, so its total is still filling in. The striped band and dashed line mark that provisional stretch.
Top recipients
By dollars committed.
How to read these numbers
- Committed through this program
Money committed under this assistance listing (its CFDA program), counted in the year each action happened.
- How it's paid
Most programs pay out one way — a grant, or a direct payment to individuals; the flow bar only appears when a program genuinely mixes types.
- Some recipients aren't itemized
For entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare, the government reports one aggregate instead of naming tens of millions of people, so the recipient roster isn't part of the public record.
- Awards, counted once
An award count is the number of distinct awards with at least one action that year — each counted once, however many times it was amended.
- The colored bars
Every bar on this page splits by how the money moves:
Direct payments