Asheville Recovers Together Grants Manager

Asheville Recovers Together Grants Manager

A temporary full-time position

After Hurricane Helene, WNC businesses had to tackle recovery challenges and a changed business landscape, necessitating grant funding and other support programs to help them recover and rebuild. While many of those programs are now closed out, a new City of Asheville CDBG-DR-funded small business grant program will be launching soon and will be managed by Mountain Biz Works in collaboration with a network of local partner organizations.

The Asheville Recovers Together Grants Manager is a temporary eighteen month full-time staff position, focused on managing this Asheville Recovers Together Small Business Grants program.

The overarching goals of the Asheville Recovers Together Grants Manager are:

• Oversight of grant program management, record-keeping, and disbursements, ensuring compliance with federal regulations.
• Management of contracted administrative support to ensure quality, consistency, and timeliness.
• Small business recovery support via successful grant deployment and administration.

• Coordinate and oversee Mountain Biz Works’ efforts related to Asheville Recovers Together Grant program administration.
• Develop materials and processes that assist small business owners with understanding the program details and requirements, and in translating their Helene losses and small business recovery needs into fundable grant applications.
• Assist in establishing and implementing work flows, efficiencies, and tracking tools, including extensive work using Airtable, Google Drive, and Salesforce.
• Ensure that the grant program maintains a focus on serving low-to-moderate income people, in compliance with federal requirements.
• Oversee the full grantmaking process. including:
• Application review
• Scoring and Allocations
• Awarding Grants
• Grant Draw Request Review
• Monitoring & Evaluation
• Oversee team of staff and contractors to process complete application packages, including screening packages against guidelines and required documents, conducting fraud checks, entering and processing applications in a tracking system, reviewing all required documents, and scoring all applications within target timeframe.
• Where needed, provide excellent customer service and technical assistance to applicants that need additional support with the CDBG-DR Grant program.
• Maintain complete, detailed and organized client records in Salesforce, Airtable, and other information systems.
• Coordinate with partner organizations that will be providing outreach and technical assistance services, as well as other Mountain Biz Works staff.
• Proactively learn the requirements, processes, and criteria to maintain federal compliance.

Participate in team meetings and as a member of the Mountain Biz Works staff.

Other duties as assigned.

• Commitment to Mountain Biz Works’ vision, mission, and values.
• Must live in Western North Carolina, or be willing to relocate here.
• Bachelor’s degree and at least three years related work experience is preferred, but education level will be considered on a holistic basis taking into account both education and work experience.
• Practical experience managing large scale projects; experience managing CDBG or similarly complex Federal programs a plus.
• Self-driven and organized, with keen attention to detail.
• Ability to prioritize the urgency of competing requests and take charge to meet deadlines.
• Strong computer proficiency, including but not limited to:
  Google Suite, Microsoft Office, email, Airtable or similar database system, form software such as Jotform or Fillout, Salesforce or similar customer relationship management (CRM) tools.
• Excellent communication skills, both verbally and written.
• An interest in problem solving, process improvement, workplace efficiency, and/or project management.
• Ability to work independently with a minimum level of direction; skill in effective planning, prioritization, and organization of workload.
• Ability to receive and seek out supervisory oversight when needed.
• Familiarity or fluency with small business topics is a plus.
• Spanish…