The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) recently announced nearly $480 million in Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program (MCSAP) grant awards to fund initiatives aimed at preventing crashes, fatalities and injuries involving large trucks and buses. In addition to the MCSAP grant, FMCSA has other grant programs that offer funding opportunities to promote commercial motor vehicle (CMV) safety, add more licensed commercial truck and bus drivers to the CMV industry, deploy the latest technology to enhance roadway safety, and more. These programs include the agency’s High Priority Grant Commercial Motor Vehicle Safety Grant, the High Priority Innovative Technology Deployment Grant, Commercial Driver’s License Program Implementation Grant, and the Commercial Motor Vehicle Operator Safety Training Grant.
While the fiscal year 2024 recipients for these additional grant programs have not been announced, previous year’s award recipients are using their grant funding to continue working with FMCSA to promote road safety.
Last month, a few of these awardees joined Our Roads, Our Safety® partners during FMCSA’s transportation safety fair to conduct an interactive, educational and engaging event. Our Roads, Our Safety® is a national outreach and education campaign launched by FMCSA to heighten education and awareness across all roadway users about sharing the road safely with large trucks and buses.
Participating grant recipients included:
Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance (CVSA) — a nonprofit organization comprised of local, state, provincial, territorial and federal commercial motor vehicle safety officials and industry representatives. CVSA aims to prevent commercial motor vehicle crashes, injuries and fatalities and believes that collaboration between government and industry improves road safety and saves lives.
Morgan State University — The largest of Maryland’s historically black colleges and universities (HBCU), this Carnegie-classified high research institution provides instruction offers over 140 academic programs leading to degrees from the baccalaureate to the doctorate.
Texas A&M Transportation Institute, specifically, Teens in the Driver Seat®, an initiative under the Texas A&M Transportation Institute’s Youth Transportation Safety (YTS) Program. Teens in the Driver Seat® is a peer-to-peer program for teens that focuses solely on traffic safety.
Each of these organizations received funding through the agency’s High Priority Commercial Motor Vehicle Safety grant program. Awardees of this funding applied with a commercial motor vehicle safety-related idea, initiative or activity that included increasing public awareness and education on CMV safety, targeting unsafe driving in high-risk crash corridors, demonstrating new technologies to improve commercial motor vehicle safety, safety data improvement, and other projects that help meet FMCSA’s mission of improving CMV safety nationwide.
While these three organizations fall within the eligibility criteria for an FMCSA grant, many other organizations, including U.S. territories and local government agencies, may be eligible to apply for this grant and other FMCSA grants like the ones below.
A High Priority Innovative Technology Deployment grant provides financial and technical assistance to states to deploy, operate, and maintain innovative road safety technologies.
The Commercial Driver’s License Program Implementation (CDLPI) grant seeks to improve roadway safety by supporting CDL programs on a state and national level. Eligible entities are encouraged apply for grant projects that will have a nationwide impact on improving the national CDL program.
FMCSA also offers the Commercial Motor Vehicle Operator Safety Training (CMVOST) grant to public or private colleges, universities, vocational-technical schools, post-secondary educational institutions, truck driver training schools, associations and state and local governments, including federally recognized tribal governments, which support CMVOST training activities.
No matter the type of grant, FMCSA encourages agencies to start now with checking eligibility, exploring training, technical guidance and tools available on our website or by visiting our grants resource center to assist with applying for future agency grant opportunities. Keep an eye on FMCSA’s website and grants.gov to learn when the next notices of funding opportunity are issued and the window for submission of grant applications is open.
