The National League of Cities (NLC) recognizes that communities nationwide are confronting increasing challenges regarding in- and out-migration in their population, particularly with recent influxes of refugees, asylees, migrants and immigrants. While the policies and procedures that regulate immigration are controlled by the federal government, the impact of these federal decisions has a direct effect on local infrastructure and resources, including the urgent need for effective shelter, services, and support for these new residents.
To address these dynamic challenges, the federal – local partnership is essential. While localities know the needs and opportunities of their communities best, it is imperative for federal partners, including those in Congress and in the Administration, to provide adequate resources and support for cities, towns and villages in navigating these challenges and opportunities.
What’s in this Dashboard?
In the absence of meaningful federal legislation to address the current immigration needs in communities across the country, NLC has compiled the current federal opportunities that local leaders can leverage to support the immigration initiatives in their community and support their refugee, asylee, migrant and immigrant residents in alignment with federal laws and regulations.
The dashboard is separated into two audiences: Local Governments and Immigrants/Residents.
Local Governments
Includes programs where the recipient is a local government – i.e., they are the program applicant and recipient of funds.
Immigrants/Residents
Includes programs that local governments should be aware of, but the recipients of program benefits may be migrants, refugees or asylees within their communities. The program description includes text recommending how local governments may use the resource to share with local partners and best support their community members.
Local leaders can utilize the filters on the dashboard to find programs that best fit the needs and initiatives in their communities. The grant type filter will indicate whether the grant program is a competitive program that localities can directly apply to (Discretionary or Competitive), whether a program is a formula program that localities may need to apply to from their federal or state partners to receive an allocation of funding (Formula), or whether the program does not have concrete funding attached and is instead a resource for local governments to use or share with community partners to support immigrants in their community (N/A).
This dashboard is not an exhaustive list of federal funding opportunities that may assist in advancing local immigration initiatives or addressing related challenges. It is intended as a jumping-off point for local leaders to learn about these resources to support local strategies, but not every program may be right for every municipality.
To learn more about eligibility requirements and if the program is right for one’s community, click on the program link in the LINK column below.
How to Use the Dashboard
- Choose Your Audience: Use the button at the top of the page to navigate between resources directly aimed at local governments for programmatic use (“Local Governments”), or resources that municipalities may publicize with the immigrants and residents in their community (“Immigrants/Residents”).
- Search by Area: Click the icons to filter the programs and resources by program area.
- Filter Results: Use the filters to customize your results by area and grant type, or search for a specific program.
- Reset: Click “Clear” to reset your filters.
- Learn More: Click on the program link to navigate to the external program webpage.
Updates to this dashboard will be made on a quarterly basis. For more information about the data and methodology used for this project, please reference the following document (PDF).
Please contact advocacy@nlc.org with questions about the development of this resource.
Terms of Use
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons by Attribution (CC BY 4.0) license. For citation, please use:
Minster, Sarah; Montes-Diaz, Ivonne; Dykema, McKaia. (2024) “Immigration Resource Dashboard.” National League of Cities, Washington, D.C.
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