Southwest Border (SWB) Rural Law Enforcement Assistance Program

The Mexico-United States border, known as the SWB, extends nearly 2,000 miles, is the tenth-longest border between two countries in the world, and is the most frequently crossed. Small, rural, and tribal law enforcement agencies located on the SWB face limited staffing and resources while also having to traverse greater distances and a variety of terrains—from rural areas to deserts—to help interdict drug trafficking and human smuggling, prevent violent crime, and protect public safety.

In 2019, the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) established a pilot initiative to provide microgrants to small, rural, and tribal law enforcement agencies located in the four SWB states of Arizona, California, New Mexico, and Texas. This program—termed the SWB Rural Law Enforcement Assistance Program (or SWB Program)—was an innovative initiative designed to provide resources, while minimizing the administrative burdens typically associated with federal grants, to small, rural, and tribal law enforcement agencies to support efforts in addressing precipitous increases of all types of crime unique to specific regions, including human trafficking, sexual assaults, extorsion, gang activity, murder, drug trafficking, and other forms of violent crime. 

The SWB Program was a micro-grant led by BJA and managed by a technical assistance (TA) provider, the Institute for Intergovernmental Research (IIR). The following program purposes were developed by BJA for funding focus under this program:

• Improve the agency’s investigative, intelligence, and/or interdiction capabilities.
• Enhance information sharing, including investigative and intelligence data sharing with other agencies.
• Enable agencies to participate in projects within the southern border or northern and middle states.
• Assist in projects/initiatives unique to an agency or its region.
• Improve dedicated communications capabilities.

Prior to opening the application process, BJA delivered two informational webinars on the application process to inform potential applicants about the funding opportunity, the criteria for eligibility, and to answer agency questions.

Application and Eligibility

Compared to a traditional grant application process (lengthy application, peer review process, collection of statistics and performance metrics, and reporting requirements), the SWB Program focused on a streamlined approach utilizing IIR as an intermediary to handle grant administration, grant reporting, and data collection for the award, both to assist the micro-grant grantee and provide reports to BJA. As part of this effort, IIR worked with BJA to create a simple and user-friendly two-page application to simplify the grant application process for smaller agencies with limited grant writing resources and expertise.

Agencies were guided to only request funding for the specific amount needed to obtain the requested item(s). Requests could not exceed $150,000 per agency. 

The following were the eligibility requirements, established by BJA, for agencies to be considered for funding: 

1. Be a small, rural, or federally recognized Indian tribe’s law enforcement agency located within the SWB states of Arizona, California, New Mexico, or Texas. 
2. Serve a population size of 100,000 or less. 
3. Request only eligible items (a list of items approved by BJA was provided).
4. Have permission from the agency’s governing authority to accept and receive the award.
5. If applicable, be able to provide law enforcement staff members with the necessary training on the use and implementation of purchased equipment or systems.
6. Be able to comply with post-award reporting requirements. These included sharing information regarding the implementation of purchased equipment and resources, identifying any benefits to the entity, discussing the administration of justice and public safety, and sharing lessons learned.

Awards Allocated

BJA allocated a total of $3,347,403.62 to 53 agencies (52 small, rural, and tribal agencies and one law enforcement coalition). Award recipients by state and by agency type were as follows:

 While most of the applicants were based in Texas, it was anticipated that more would be received from the state since Texas shares around half of the U.S./Mexico border.

This program’s success relied on the expertise and judgment of law enforcement professionals in border communities to prioritize essential equipment investments that would achieve the best programmatic impact. Small and rural agencies made informed decisions to equip their officers with reliable, up-to-date gear crucial for safety and community responsiveness. Their leadership assessed cost-effective, sustainable investments that improved mission effectiveness and kept pace with technological advancements. In addition, law enforcement leaders had to make equipment decisions during the COVID-19 pandemic, when backordered equipment, shipping embargoes, and computer chip shortages were unique challenges.

After a review of all submitted applications, it became clear to BJA that most applicants only applied for what was needed, many not requesting the maximum $150,000 available. This approach differentiates small and rural agencies from larger agencies that usually apply for the maximum available funding.

Equipment Purchased

Throughout the SWB Program, BJA learned of many disparities associated with the technology accessible by many of the SWB officers. These included critical technology, such as computers, laptops, in-car video cameras, mobile security cameras, automated license plate readers, computer-aided dispatch systems, and more. While most of these types of equipment are routinely available to officers in larger police departments, many of the small, rural, or tribal law enforcement agencies battled with outdated technology or simply did without. The funding made available to these agencies made a real impact in their ability to access and share vital information to do their jobs effectively and to support officer safety. A summary of equipment purchases is provided below.

Award Flexibility

The SWB Program was designed to be flexible and responsive to the evolving needs of agencies. For example, if an agency experienced any issues with a particular equipment vendor, if items requested were no longer available from the manufacturer, or if the agency found that their needs had changed and that they needed to purchase different equipment than originally requested, agencies were permitted to submit written requests for adjustments. It is important to note that most of this program occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic, when equipment availability and shipping times were greatly impacted for months to sometimes up to a year. Because of these delays and equipment shortages, many of the SWB agencies required additional time to acquire and implement their requested equipment. Because of BJA’s flexibility for this program, extensions through subaward agreement amendments were permitted. In comparison to traditional grants, which require a formal grant adjustment modification to be approved by the BJA Program Office (and, in some circumstances, approval by the Office of the Chief Financial Officer, Office of Justice Programs), the microgrants provided subaward recipients with flexibility and more efficient turnaround when adjustments were needed.

Program Impact and Success

The impact and success of the SWB Program was evaluated using a three-pronged approach: 

• Post-implementation evaluations to share information on how the equipment purchased was implemented and the benefits to the agency and its mission.
• In-person microgrant roundtable attended and participated in by several subaward recipients to discuss their SWB Program experiences with BJA representatives.
• Program evaluation questionnaire to share agency experiences with the SWB Program, with the stages of the subaward process, and with the TA provider support.