The City of San Antonio has announced the inaugural recipients of its Climate Ready Community Action Fund, a grant program launched earlier this year that seeks to help local community organizations and businesses implement sustainability projects.
However, with the city fund supplying the grant awards potentially on the chopping block in the upcoming budget, the grant program could be short-lived.
City officials say that isn’t necessarily the case, noting in an emailed statement to the San Antonio Report Thursday that the city has supplied similar grants in the past by utilizing federal grant opportunities.
“These efforts will continue as we stay consistent with Climate Action & Adaptation Plan goals and priorities,” said Brian Chasnoff, assistant director of the city’s Communications and Engagement department. Launched in 2019, the city’s climate action plan sets significant sustainability goals for the city, including its goal to be carbon neutral by 2050.
In total, 133 businesses and organizations were selected as recipients for the new Climate Ready Community Action Fund grants, which will add up to about $2 million collectively. Projects include everything from installing basic weatherization measures to upgrading HVAC systems and installing solar panels, the city stated in a press release. Recipients include notable local institutions such as the Doseum, the University of the Incarnate Word and the Maestro Center. See the full list of recipients here.
The Office of Sustainability aimed to keep the application as accessible as possible this first time around, said Kate Jaceldo, the city’s Climate Adaptation Manager.
“This program really was about pushing dollars to the community, both to organizations and businesses, to take steps that are going to move the Climate Plan forward,” said Doug Melnick, the City of San Antonio’s chief sustainability officer. “We didn’t want to be prescriptive on what folks were doing.”
Funding concerns
The new grant program is being funded through the Resiliency, Energy, Efficiency and Sustainability (REES) Fund and managed by the Office of Sustainability.
The REES Fund was established in 2022 by former Councilwoman Ana Sandoval (D7). The city reserves a percentage of CPS Energy revenues for the fund each year, which are then meant to be directed to green initiatives by the city.
However, city administrators have proposed an additional $27.7 million adjustment to the city’s budget over the next three years to close the gap created by wage increases firefighters won in their recent contract negotiations.
This adjustment is set to include cutting a significant portion of this fund in future years. While the REES fund would not be affected during the 2025 fiscal year, which starts Oct. 1, it will be affected in the following two years.
This year, the REES Fund supported grants to small businesses that wanted to make energy efficient improvements or “enhance community sustainability efforts and foster resilience.” In 2023, it was used for grants to schools that plan to improve energy efficiency as well as a “cool pavement” pilot program.
Lessons learned
It’s unclear at this time if the program will be continued on an annual basis, Melnick said, adding the Office of Sustainability is currently working on an impact study regarding this initial round of grants. They plan to present it to city staff and council once it is complete.
“We want to really understand what were the results and quantify those impacts,” he said. “The plan is during this next year we’ll prepare a report on what were the emissions reductions.”
This first round of grants through the new program was, in many ways, a learning experience, Jaceldo said. Many of the applicants were encouraged to apply and helped by the Maestro Entrepreneur Center, a business development organization headquartered on the near West Side that serves small businesses across Bexar County and is a grant recipient itself.
“We probably leaned a little bit too heavily on traditional media outreach,” Jaceldo said. “I think in the future we would want to do more workshops, and honestly just sitting down with folks — have them bring the application in and start working through some of it.”
If the grant is continued in the future, it would need to be funded through other methods, likely through federal grant opportunities, the city said.
“Federal grants and private sector sponsorship opportunities could fill the funding gap,” Chasnoff wrote in an email. He added that the REES Fund could still supply dollars to such grants if the payment made by CPS Energy exceeds 10% of the adopted city payment base budget.
“We will continue to work across the City of San Antonio organization to leverage departmental budgets that align with community and City climate goals, and we will continue to work to take advantage of unprecedented federal funding for sustainability and climate initiatives,” he said.
