Rural and Tribal Assistance Pilot Program
New Application Opening Date to be Determined
Due to technical issues applicants experienced when attempting to apply for Rural and Tribal Assistance (RTA) Program funding, the application portal has been closed. The RTA program will not review any applications submitted and no grants will be awarded from applications submitted during the portal opening between March 18 and March 21, 2025. We appreciate the efforts of communities to prepare applications and regret any inconvenience.
We are working to resolve the issues and establish a new date for the application submissions as soon as possible. All communities interested in FY24 RTA funding must apply when the portal reopens - this includes any community that applied between March 18 and March 21, 2025.
The Bureau will announce the new date on grants.gov, LinkedIn and here, the RTA Program webpage https://www.transportation.gov/buildamerica/RuralandTribalGrants.
Please continue to check back here and follow the Build America Bureau on LinkedIn for updates.
Background
The Bureau issued a Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) for up to $27 million in no-match grants on a first-come, first-served basis. An updated notice of funding announcement and application question documents were added on March 13, 2025.
Notice of Funding Opportunity
Multi-Community Application
Single Project Application
Visit Grants.gov: https://www.grants.gov/search-results-detail/357673
The Bureau held an informational webinar on January 14, 2025. View the slides and the recorded webinar (passcode: S6CyH1q%)
Not sure if your project is rural?
Your project is eligible if:
The project is not in a Census Bureau 2020 designated urban area.
OR - The project is in a Census Bureau 2020 designated urban area with a population of 150,000 or less.
Your project is not eligible if it is in a Census Bureau 2020 designated urban area that has a population of more than 150,000 people.
Also, you may wish to visit: Rural Eligibility | US Department of Transportation.
For step-by-step instructions on using the eligibility tool, please view this tutorial.*
Additional resource: Lookup an address to see if it is rural on Tigerweb* -- follow these instructions.
*Accessibility statement: If you need assistance using this tool, please email RuralandTribalTA@dot.gov.
The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) enhanced the Build America Bureau’s capacity to help more communities advance infrastructure projects that enhance the safety, efficiency, and quality of the country’s transportation system. A key enhancement was the creation of multiple new programs to be administered by the Bureau, resulting in enhanced technical assistance to support communities without the resources to explore innovative financing and project delivery methods for their projects.
The IIJA created the Rural and Tribal Assistance Pilot Program, which provides grants to support legal, technical, and financial advisors to help advance infrastructure projects.
Eligible project sponsors may receive grant funds to select advisors to assist with pre-development-phase activities, including:
• feasibility studies
• project planning
• revenue forecasting and funding and financing options analyses
• preliminary engineering and design work
• environmental review
• economic assessments and cost-benefit analyses
• public benefits studies
• statutory and regulatory framework analyses
• value-for-money (VFM) studies
• evaluations of costs to sustain the project
• evaluation opportunities for private financing and project bundling
For more information, please email RuralandTribalTA@dot.gov.
FY23 Information:
Click this link to view the 2023 Applications Dashboard.
Check out the Rural and Tribal Community Resources page for other programs.