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Annex H: FAM Part 5 - Regulatory Grant Program

CHAPTER 5-100

REGULATORY PROGRAMS OVERVIEW

5-100-00 What is the purpose of this chapter?

5-100-10 Where does this information come from?

5-100-20 What are OSMRE’s regulatory financial assistance programs?

5-100-30 What budget estimates of your regulatory funding needs must you send us?

5-100-40 How will we distribute annual regulatory grant funding?

5-100-50 Can you use regulatory funds to cover certain bond forfeiture costs?

5-100-00 What is the purpose of this chapter?

This chapter provides a general overview of financial assistance programs in our coal regulatory 

program. The instructions in this chapter apply to all regulatory assistance programs and 

agreements awarded by us, the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement 

(OSMRE), to you, a state or tribe with active coal mining. 

5-100-10 Where does this information come from?

Title V of the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 (SMCRA), P.L. 95-87, 

authorizes us to fund state, tribal and Federal programs to control the environmental impacts of 

surface coal mining. It authorizes states and tribes to develop and assume regulatory primacy, 

act as the regulatory authority, and operate their coal regulatory program. Our regulations at 30 

CFR Chapter VII implement SMCRA.

5-100-20 What are OSMRE’s regulatory financial assistance programs?

We provide financial assistance under the following programs to states and tribes to implement 

the coal regulatory provisions of Title V.

A. Interim grants to fund the initial regulatory program.

B. Program development grants to assist states and tribes to develop a permanent program.

C. Administration and Enforcement (A&E) grants to states and tribes to operate an approved 

permanent regulatory program. See Chapter 5-110 for more information.

D. Federal lands cooperative agreements to States which elect to administer their approved 

regulatory program on Federal lands. See Chapter 5-120 for more information.

E. Small Operator Assistance Program (SOAP) operational grants to states to assist small 

coal mine operators to meet their permit requirements. See Chapter 5-130 for more 

information.
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5-100-30 What budget estimates of your regulatory funding needs must you send us?

A. Eighteen months before the beginning of each Federal fiscal year (FY), you must send us 

your estimated program budget with the regulatory funding you will request for that FY. 

You must break out the program budget by the categories listed below. We will review 

your estimates and use this information in preparing our Federal budget request.

1. Show functional categories: permitting, inspection and enforcement, SOAP 

administration, lands unsuitable and other administrative costs.

2. Show object class categories: personnel and fringe benefits, travel, equipment, 

supplies, contractual, other and indirect costs.

3. If applicable, show the estimated costs of Federal lands and SOAP operations. 

B. Three months before the beginning of the FY, you must send us an updated estimate of 

your regulatory funding needs, using the same format as the eighteen-month estimates. 

5-100-40 How will we distribute annual regulatory grant funding?

A. If we have enough regulatory funds available, we will distribute to each state and tribe 

the amount you requested or the amount recommended by our awarding office. The 

distribution process designates funds for a particular state or tribe, but does not actually 

award or provide any funds.

B. If we do not have enough funds available to fund the total regulatory needs of all states 

and tribes, we will distribute the available funds among the states and tribes as equitably 

as possible.

C. When we distribute a specific amount of funds to you, it does not commit us to award 

you a grant for that amount. You must still apply for your grant, and we will approve or 

disapprove it based on your application and program. See Chapter 5-200 for more 

information on your application and Chapter 5-210 on our review and award processing.

D. When Congress appropriates regulatory grant funds, they specify whether we may 

obligate the funds during a period of one fiscal year or two fiscal years. In either event, 

we normally award regulatory grants for a twelve month period using the current fiscal 

year’s annual appropriation. 

5-100-50 Can you use regulatory funds to cover certain bond forfeiture costs?

This section explains which reclamation activities associated with bond forfeiture sites are 

allowable costs under the regulatory program grant. You must fund activities which are not 

allowable under the grant with the proceeds of the forfeited bond or other State resources.
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A. Sites forfeited under the permanent program.

1. You may fund administrative costs not directly associated with site-specific 

reclamation from your regulatory grant if the costs are part of the forfeiture 

process or if the activities would have been performed had there been no 

forfeiture. Allowable costs may include site inventories, site priority ranking 

activities, forfeiture processing, site inspections, and contract monitoring to the 

extent that it does not exceed the level of effort that would have been expended 

had there been no forfeiture.

2. You cannot use grant funds for costs associated with site-specific activities 

directly related to completion of the reclamation plan. Unallowable costs include 

redesign of a reclamation plan after forfeiture and the reclamation work itself. 

You must fund these costs from the proceeds of forfeited bonds or with other state 

resources.

B. Sites forfeited under the Initial Program

1. SMCRA’s Initial Regulatory Program did not require reclamation bonds. 

However, section 505(b) of SMCRA did not prevent a state from imposing 

bonding requirements for initial program sites as a more stringent environmental 

control. Therefore, administrative costs related to bond forfeiture on initial 

program sites may be an allowable program cost if an approved regulatory 

program contains bonding provisions.

2. Administrative costs associated with “bid preparation” are considered to be 

allowable program costs, to the extent that they do not include the costs of 

designing or redesigning the approved reclamation plan. 

a. Eligible costs include those related to bid specification preparation, such 

as planimeter work and office calculations needed to determine areas and 

volumes. Reclamation costs are allowable to the extent that they would 

normally be incurred regardless of the quality of the original reclamation 

plan. Such costs include site visits and limited surveys to obtain data 

necessary for the preparation of bid specifications, including those 

conducted to determine drainage control needs, backfilling and grading 

volumes or the size of areas in need of seeding or soil amendments.

b. Ineligible costs include those related to the preparation of new maps, plans 

or drawings and those related to site surveys conducted for the purpose of 

horizontal or vertical control, acquisition of photogrammetric data or 

preparation of a new reclamation plan or design. The costs of the 

reclamation work itself are also ineligible.