Lorien: Our process is the same as Sedgwick County. Grant applications are approved since these types of funding sometimes have future years' committments attached. Acceptance of the grant award though does not go through our elected officials. No formal written policy just past practice on our part.

Bullhead City, AZ also takes all grants to the City Council for final approval. Interestingly, the Council recently asked why we were bringing a $500 Target (National Night Out) grant to them for approval. They asked us to look into revising the policy so that simple grants would not require council acceptance. I will most likely propose a policy change where council approval would not be necessary for those grants under $10,000 and/or those requiring no match.

In terms of most federal agencies, there is a standard requirement for the local governing body to approve especially where there is a fiduciary set of obligations and/or local match of some form. In terms of state and/or Foundation grants, the requirements are widely varied. The point here is that it is imporant to keep in mind that regardless of local policy or practice, there may be a need to carry out an approval process imposed by the funder that is different from the local policy. Also, I have worked in circumstances where local governments have created nonprofit corporations (primarily for economic development related) that expands the capacity and scope of pursuing grants. In most instances involving the nonprofit corporation, the general practice was to secure the Mayor's sign off (even in Council-Manager) .

Suwanee, GA takes them to our Council for approval prior to submitting an application. Even if the grant does not require any financial match from the City, it may require a policy decision by Council or we want to make them aware that we're dedicating staff resources to implementing the grant.

I've attached the City Council resolution adopting the City of Sacramento, CA, FY13 budget. Section 11 lays out the conditions under which grants do not need further Council approval. Sections 5.1 and 5.2 discuss changes in FTE for previously-approved grants. Section 10.13 calls out grants from certain funding sources. Over time we found what Council was comfortable approving in advance and put that language in our annual budget resolution. Any grant actions not meeting the criteria in the annual budget resolution are brought to Council for specific approval.