Growth Management Services often has opportunities to fund community planning and development. This page contains information on open grants and current funding cycles for local governments.
Current opportunities
Grant programs
Status: Ongoing
Commerce administers grants and provides technical assistance to cities and counties to plan for climate change. Commerce has made approximately $30 million available in statewide grants for the 2023-2025 biennium with an expectation that additional resources will be appropriated through the current periodic update.
Applications for the 2023-2025 biennium remain open on a rolling basis as funds remain available. Cities and counties due to submit a 2025 or 2026 comprehensive plan update will receive priority for the current biennium’s available funding.
Fully planning counties are eligible for between $300,000 — $800,000. Fully planning cities are eligible for between $100,000 — $700,000. Funding allocation is based on both population and required updates to the comprehensive plan for each jurisdiction.
Climate planning activities eligible for funding can be found in the grant application instructions.
Grant materials
Grant workshop materials
- Pre-application Climate Planning grant workshop presentation (PDF)
- Pre-application Climate Planning grant workshop recording (Vimeo) for the 2023-2025 biennium
Climate grants from Commerce are provided with funding from Washington’s Climate Commitment Act. The CCA supports Washington’s climate action efforts by putting cap-and-invest dollars to work reducing climate pollution, creating jobs, and improving public health. Information about the CCA is available at www.climate.wa.gov.
Status: Closed
The Connection Housing to Infrastructure Program (CHIP) funds utility connections for affordable housing. By covering the upfront costs of infrastructure and connecting housing to municipal systems, the program makes affordable housing projects more viable and helps bring more affordable housing units online.
The latest round of CHIP funding closed on Oct. 31, 2024. See the list of funding requests (PDF). Awards will be announced in January 2025.
Refer to the CHIP webpage for program guidelines, pre-application workshop materials and additional resources.
Status: Closed
Coordinating Low-Income Housing Planning grants support activities that plan for and accommodate housing that is affordable for individuals and families earning less than 50 percent of the area median income.
Grants are available to a county or a city planning department, a homeless housing lead or similar department within a local government, or a local non-profit provider of affordable or homeless housing or services in partnership with one or more local governments. Up to $50,000 in funding is available for each county or regional application, so applicants are encouraged to work together.
Funding is available for a variety of eligible activities, such as coordinating policies and data, housing needs allocations, and developing countywide planning policies that support the lowest income housing needs.
Applications are open until January 31, 2025 or until funding is exhausted. Please contact Courtney Williams with any questions. See the Grant Instructions below for more details.
Application materials
- CLIHP Grant Instructions (PDF)
- CLIHP Grant Application (Word)
- Pre-application webinar recording (VIMEO), PowerPoint presentation (PDF), and FAQ (PDF)
Completed applications should be submitted to gmsgrants@commerce.wa.gov.
Awarded funding
Status: Currently Closed
This grant program is designed to support cities and counties in the transition from paper to digital permit review processes, and address housing shortages in their jurisdictions.
Grants of up to $375,000 are available to assists jurisdictions in fully or partially updating their permit review process from paper filing systems to software systems capable of processing digital permit applications, virtual inspections, electronic review, and with capacity for video storage.
Application scoring will prioritize jurisdictions who currently have a paper-only or hybrid permitting system and are experiencing growth pressures measured by increases in population and residential permitting numbers.
Application information
- Paper to Digital Grant application instructions (PDF)
- Paper to Digital Grant application (Smartsheet)
- Paper to Digital FAQ (PDF)
Pre-application workshop
Commerce hosted a pre-application workshop on July 25, 2024 to provide more information about this grant opportunity.
Questions?
Email Allan Johnson, Project Manager, at allan.johnson@commerce.wa.gov. Visit Commerce’s Local Project Review webpage for more information.
Status: Closed
The governor and the Legislature made a historic investment in Growth Management Act planning during the 2022 legislative session and have continued that into the 2023-2025 budget period. As a result, we expect to provide grant funding to all counties, and cities within those counties, in advance of their upcoming comprehensive plan and development regulation “periodic updates,” required under RCW 36.70A.130(5).
Grants are available to counties and cities based on fully planning or partially planning status under the GMA, as well as population:
Fully planning
- Counties with 100,000 population and over: $700,000
- Counties under 100,000 population: $350,000
- Cities with 100,000 population and over: $325,000
- Cities with 50,000 to 99,999 population: $175,000
- Cities with 3,000 to 49,999 population: $125,000
- Cities under 3,000 population: $100,000
Partially planning
- Counties with 10,000 population and over: $150,000
- Counties under 10,000 population: $100,000
- Cities (No population limits): $20,000
Starting July 1, 2023, counties and cities with a 2025 deadline are eligible to receive the first half of their grant, with the second half coming the following year. Commerce intends to provide these same grant amounts to all counties and cities throughout the update cycle, with due dates from 2024 through 2027, under RCW 36.70A.130(5)(a)-(d). Grants should be available for all jurisdictions starting two years before the statutory deadlines for review and revision, established under RCW 36.70A.130(5).
Grant requirements
Periodic Update Grant (PUG) award notifications and instructions have been distributed to counties and cities with 2025 and 2026 updates. Awarded jurisdictions with updates due in 2026 must sign their Year 1 grant contracts by Jan. 24, 2025. Jurisdictions are eligible to request grant reimbursement for all periodic update grant work, defined in the grant agreements.
Application materials
Local agency representatives can select the following links based on their periodic update due date:
Status: Currently Closed
Commerce has consulted with tribes within Washington state to co-design a strategy for the distribution of $50 million of Climate Commitment Act (CCA) dollars that the Washington Legislature appropriated for tribal climate resilience in the 2023-2025 biennium.
Funds from this grant program can be used for all project stages: planning, feasibility studies, pre-construction, and construction costs. Tribes have the flexibility to determine the best use of this funding to address their climate resiliency needs.