WASHINGTON–The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Community Development Financial Institutions Fund (CDFI Fund) said it is pausing acceptance of new applications for certification as a Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI).
What it described as a “blackout” period will be implemented for a period of 90 days to allow the CDFI Fund to administer critical system updates that affect the CDFI Certification process, Treasury said. The CDFI Fund will resume accepting new CDFI Certification application submissions on Nov. 1, 2018.
Organizations either in the process of applying for CDFI Certification or that intend to do so in the near future have until July 31, 2018, to submit their applications using an interim submission process, outlined below, according to Treasury. The CDFI Fund will review all certification applications submitted by the July 31, 2018 deadline. Any applications received on or after August 1, 2018 will not be considered and must be resubmitted once the blackout period ends on Nov. 1, 2018.
Treasury said the CDFI Fund is currently in the process of implementing systems changes that will transition the CDFI Certification application to the new Awards Management Information System (AMIS). AMIS is a unified technology platform that will support all CDFI Fund programs through each phase of the program life cycle, including CDFI Certification and compliance monitoring. The blackout period is necessary to provide the CDFI Fund an opportunity to convert to the updated system for processing CDFI Certification application, Treasury added.
Effective immediately and through July 31, 2018, Treasury said the CDFI Fund will be deploying an interim process for the submission of CDFI Certification applications. Organizations must first submit a CDFI Certification Signature Page through the myCDFIFund portal, and then separately submit all required application documents and attachments to the “Org Related Attachments” section in AMIS. For info: www.cdfifund.gov/cdficert under How to Apply Step 1: Apply.