Chapter 4, Section 2

1. Three Fundamental Elements
   

   A crucial first element is that each funding organization with a SEE enrollee will appoint one EPA staff member who will serve as the "SEE Coordinator" for that SEE cooperative agreement. In essence, the SEE Coordinator will be the decision-making official within that funding organization on all programmatic and financial matters relating to that cooperative agreement. Any issues which cannot be resolved by the SEE Coordinator at the local level should be referred to the National SEE Office for resolution.

   Second, SEE grantees will provide a quarterly report (See Fig. 4-1, 4-2, 4-3, and 4-4.) to the SEE Coordinator for each SEE cooperative agreement in accordance with the requirements listed in Section 3 of this Chapter. This document will be a consolidated resources report for the entire cooperative agreement, as well as breakdowns by site. This quarterly document will allow each EPA program office to "balance" its own SEE cooperative agreement "checkbook". Any discrepancies between the two sets of books will be mediated by the staff of the SEE Program Office.

   Third, the SEE Coordinator is asked to review the "Grantee's Quarterly Report" to verify that expenses are within estimated funding projections and that enrollees are being charged to appropriate sites.

2. Processing Times
   

   The processing time for SEE packages varies depending on whether the funding action is part of a proposal for a new agreement, an amendment to an existing agreement, or a reimbursable interagency agreement.

   • New agreement proposals take approximately six to ten weeks, since multiple levels of internal reviews and sign-offs are required before the documents are finalized and sent to GAD for processing and awarding. New proposals which exceed $1 million, over a three-year period, must be approved by the Senior Resource Official of each Region and AA-ship (EPA Order - Senior Resource Officials and Resource Management Committee 1130.2a dated 11/6/95). Proposals for less than $1 million are reviewed by the SEE Coordinator.

   Amendments to existing agreements are generally processed within three to five weeks.

   Reimbursable interagency agreements take approximately ten weeks due to multiple agency sign off and the transfer of authorized funding between agencies.

   The processing times, noted above, pertain to the funding package after it is received in the SEE Office. It does not include the time necessary to obtain required authorization on Commitment Notices, prepare budget screens, or obtain a "Certification of Non Displacement."

   Therefore, it is important to plan and fund ahead in order to avoid a furlough of enrollees due to the lack of obligated funds. To do this, the SEE Coordinator examines each "Grantee's Quarterly Report" and immediately focuses on the bottom line "action item". That line indicates the date that funding expires. Depending on the type of funding action, new documents should be prepared and submitted five to ten weeks prior to the depletion of funds. Program Offices which adopt annual funding plans should submit funding early in the fiscal year (December/January).

3. Managing SEE Enrollee Expenditures
   

   To further understand the details of this process, the following is a listing of SEE Coordinator's responsibilities (which are also listed in Chapter 2, Section 8, Item a):

   • to serve as the principal point of contact with the SEE Coordinator in the Office of Human Resources and Organizational Services;
   • to serve as the principal point of contact for the funding office with the SEE grantee;
   • to coordinate any funding amendment packages for existing cooperative agreements;
   • to be responsible for the overall programmatic and financial management of the SEE cooperative agreement;
   • to review all new three year funding proposals submitted by the grantee;
   • to forward to Senior Resource Official for concurrence any proposals that exceed $1 million;
   • to sign or initial all resource documents relating to the particular cooperative agreement as the official representing the funding office;
   • to assist in the development of annual funding plans and advise individual funding offices of their funding requirements;
   • to ensure that sites within a cooperative agreement are fully funded;
   • to resolve all disagreements relating to the cooperative agreement between sub�-offices within the funding organization and to forward, in writing, the final determination to the SEE Coordinator;
   • to do a quarterly reconciliation between Office or Region records and the "Grantee's Quarterly Report;"
   • to approve all overtime requests or delegate that authority to enrollee monitors;
   • to insure that a current roster of monitors (and alternates) is developed and maintained. (The roster should include the current organizational mailing addresses, room numbers, e-mail addresses, fax numbers and telephone numbers);
   • to distribute grantee quarterly report information to any site Directors within their office; and
   • to retain or delegate to monitors, or a designated local representative, the responsibility for keeping copies of enrollee time sheets.

   Occasionally, the scope of work for the three year assignments may be augmented over the initial funding estimates. Should this amount exceed the original estimates by $1 million or more, it is recommended that written approval be obtained from the SRO to enhance the original scope of work. This approval should be forwarded to the National SEE Office. Grants Administration Division will then be notified of the modification to the original proposal.

   It sometimes happens that "sites" or "subaccounts" within a cooperative agreement run negative. It is the task of the SEE Coordinator to balance the resources so that funding obligations are met. Documentation among the affected sites/subaccounts should be provided to the Director so that necessary adjustments can be made by the grantee. Note: Use of an annual plan should eliminate most of these situations.

   Each Region or Program Office assumes the responsibility for tracking its own SEE cooperative agreement resources. The Director may track SEE cooperative agreement resources to any level of detail that is necessary. A SEE Coordinator can elect to track resources to the level of the entire SEE cooperative agreement, to the level of each site/subaccount within the cooperative agreement, or to the level of each SEE enrollee. The program office will determine the level of analysis based on its needs.

   EPA grant regulations require non profit organizations receiving SEE cooperative agreements to submit a quarterly report on the current status of funds to the SEE Coordinator. It is the Director's responsibility to disseminate the information to the appropriate staff persons within the program office.

   Each quarterly report contains expenditures to date from the inception of the agreement, as well as information on each enrollee and each funding action obligated through the end of the quarter. By tracking expenditures to the site/subaccount level or the entire cooperative agreement level, the SEE Coordinator can simply use the Grantee's Quarterly Report to "balance" the "SEE Cooperative Agreement Checkbook"

4. Grantee's Quarterly Report
   

   The Grantee's quarterly report will consist of three sections. The first section contains the Quarterly Financial Status Report (QFSR) which details the total expenditures to date, from the inception of the agreement, together with expenditures for the most recent quarter, and a listing of submitted but unawarded budgets (Fig. 4-1). An Agreement can extend from three to five years. If there are multiple funding sites / subaccounts within the Agreement, a QFSR should be submitted for each site/subaccount. A combined cumulative QFSR would provide information for the entire Agreement. The second section provides the Quarterly Enrollee Report (Fig. 4-2) which lists each enrollee by site/subaccount and further identifies their current status (active or separated), date enrolled, date separated, hourly rate of pay and work hours per pay period. The third section addresses the Quarterly Financial Award Report (Fig. 4-4) which is a listing of each funding increment (commitment notice) awarded to the Cooperative Agreement, by site/subaccount and date, since the inception of the Agreement.

   Use of these three reports should provide the SEE Coordinator with the tools necessary to more accurately track the status and funding of sites/subaccounts within each Agreement. Individual Directors should work with their respective National Grantee if they are in need of more detailed information, i.e., specific data on individual enrollees.

5. Quarterly Financial Status Report
   

   1) Since it takes five to ten weeks for an amendment to be processed (once the package is received in the SEE Program Office), some amendments may still be pending when the Grantee's Quarterly Financial Status Report is distributed. Therefore, the number on the line of "Total Cooperative Agreement $s Awarded" is only the amount that has actuallv been obligated by the Grants Administration Division at the time the Grantee's Quarterly Report is given to an office.

   2) The term "action item" next to the number of funded weeks remaining in this cooperative agreement is specifically so titled to draw immediate attention. The number of weeks listed tells how many remaining weeks are expected to be funded given the current obligated amount in the cooperative agreement.

   This report only gives an estimate of how many weeks are left using existing funds at current spending levels. It does not include any funding packages that are pending, nor does it account for additional hires, anniversary increments, increased levels of training and/or travel or potential changes to the benefits rates. The "Life to Date" column reflects all expenditures from the inception of agreement which normally spans three years. The agreement may be extended for another two years. Before the current agreement ends, the Grantee will prepare a new agreement to replace the old. Once in place, all new funding is applied to the new agreement. Directors may receive two reports, representing the old and new agreements. As money expires on the old agreement, enrollees will be transferred to the new agreement. No action is necessary on the part of the Director, other than to be aware of the transfer.

   3) Administrative costs reflecting a 15% expenditure for each quarter are not displayed in the column labeled "This Quarter" since they do not occur on a consistent basis. Some quarters may be well below the 15%, whereas, others may exceed the 15%.

   Allowable administrative costs occur over the life of the three year agreement. The exclusion of this fluctuating data from "This Quarter" allows for a more accurate analysis of enrollee expenditures from one quarter to the next. Note however, that the "LIFE-TO-DATE" column reflects this information since it contains the actual expenditures to date, from the beginning of the agreement.

   4) If a recent request for an amendment with additional funds (EPA Form 2550-9) was submitted to the SEE Program Office and that amount does not appear in the line "Budgets submitted but unawarded," then the SEE Program Office should be contacted to determine its status.

   5) Each grantee offers different benefits for its enrollees. Please be aware of that percentage rate if SEE resources are to be tracked to the level of each enrollee. Your appropriate grantee should be contacted for the most recent benefit rate.

   6) "Medical monitoring costs" and "safety equipment" are specifically listed on the form because they are becoming more and more important as enrollees support EPA program-support activities.

   Once past the uniform manner of operating as described above, what happens in each individual Program Office is the SEE Coordinator's decision. Likewise, the choice of computer software to track the resources is also up to tile SEE Coordinator. If necessary, assistance will be provided by the SEE program office to develop an appropriate tracking model for various offices.