COPS Anti-Methamphetamine Program (CAMP)—

How Decisions were Made to Allocate 

Approximately $5 Million When More than $6.7

Million was Requested

The COPS Office received applications from nine eligible state law enforcement agencies requesting 

$6,709,026 in federal funding for the FY 2017 COPS Anti-Methamphetamine Program (CAMP). 

The COPS Office developed an application to meet the 

requirements of the law

This is the fourth fiscal year that the COPS Office has received funding for CAMP. As in the previous fiscal 

year, CAMP focuses on advancing public safety by providing funds to investigate illicit activities related 

to the manufacture and distribution of methamphetamine. Only state law enforcement agencies 

authorized by law or by a state agency to engage in or supervise anti-methamphetamine investigative 

activities were eligible to apply for funding. 

The COPS Office balanced scoring indicators

Applicants were asked to submit information regarding their jurisdiction’s methamphetamine problem 

on such indicators as

• reported seizures of methamphetamine for the previous three years; 

• current anti-methamphetamine investigative activities; 

• planned or current involvement in an anti-methamphetamine task force. 

The community policing philosophy engages in a proactive and systematic examination of identified 

problems that can be countered with effective responses. Community policing relies heavily on 

partnerships and relationships between law enforcement and the community it serves. Narrative 

questions were designed to examine an agency’s formation of collaborations with federal, state, local, 

or tribal partners such as other law enforcement and public agencies, private organizations, or 

participation in multijurisdictional task forces. Agencies were asked to identify and describe the types of 

partnerships they intended to initiate or enhance in order to address their identified methamphetamine 

problem.
The COPS Office verified the data that was submitted

The application system contains numerous built-in logic checks to help prevent the submission of 

erroneous data. In addition, once the applications were submitted, specialists in the COPS Office 

immediately reviewed the data contained therein. The COPS Office verified information provided in 

applications using data from the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP). This data verification 

process was crucial to ensuring that all applicants were properly evaluated based on accurately and 

consistently reported seizure data. 

The COPS Office developed a uniform system of 

evaluating the information that applicants submitted

Comprehensive Review

The nine eligible applications underwent a comprehensive review process conducted by external 

methamphetamine subject matter expert (SME) peer reviewers. 

SME peer reviewers evaluated the following criteria in the Project Narrative and Budget Narrative 

sections of the application to determine the quality of each application. The reviewers looked at the 

following:

• Problem identification

• Current methamphetamine investigative activities

• Anti-methamphetamine task force participation

• Collaboration and partnerships

• High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area threat assessment regarding methamphetamine

• Strategy to achieve program goals

• Applicable and allowable budget items requested

The SME peer reviewers then developed recommendations based on a rating of "Highly

Recommended," "Recommended," or "Not Recommended" for each proposal. From the 

recommendations, five agencies ranked within the "Highly Recommended" rating, and four agencies 

ranked within the "Recommended" rating; and no agencies received the “Not Recommended” rating. 

Additional Consideration 

In FY 2017 the COPS Office provided additional consideration to state, local, and tribal applicants that 

certified their cooperation with federal law enforcement to address illegal immigration. 
Data Scoring

The focus for funding was on state-level law enforcement agencies in states with high rates of identified 

methamphetamine problems, as indicated through the following sources of state-wide data:

• Number of seizures of precursor chemicals

• Numbers of seizures of finished methamphetamine

• Number of seizures of methamphetamine laboratories

• Number of laboratory dump seizures

State methamphetamine seizure data for all applicants was scored and ranked within their respective 

recommendation rating categories. At this time, because of funding availability, applicants that received 

“Recommended” and “Not Recommended” ratings were removed from further consideration. A 

methodology for scoring was established to analyze and rank the seizure data provided in each 

application. Each category is of equal value, and the data was scored based on the rate of change 

between each year and the most recent year's data. The following is a classification of each item that 

was scored:

• Seizure data rates for the past three years 

• Seizures of precursor chemicals rate for the past three years 

• Seizures of finished methamphetamine rate for the past three years

• Seizures of methamphetamine laboratories rate for the past three years 

• Laboratory dump seizures rate for the past three years

A methodology for the methamphetamine seizure rates was established to analyze and rank the seizure 

data provided in each application. A median, using the data for the states in which applications were 

received, was determined using the states’ multiple methamphetamine seizure numbers identified here. 

Applications were then ranked using the following criteria:

1. Applicants that received a “highly recommended” rating and had a number for the total 

methamphetamine seizures at or above the median for all applicants meeting the basic minimum 

requirements

2. Applicants that received a “recommended” rating and had a number for the total 

methamphetamine seizures at or above the median for all applicants meeting the basic minimum 

requirements

3. Applicants that received a “highly recommended” rating and had a number for the total 

methamphetamine seizures below the median for all applicants meeting the basic minimum 

requirements

4. Applicants that received a “recommended” rating and had a number for the total 

methamphetamine seizures below the median for all applicants meeting the basic minimum 

requirements