Community Water Enrichment Fund

Community Water Enrichment Fund

CWEF was established in the 2008 Louisiana regular legislative session by way of HB 926 (Act 513). Its intent is to provide a source of funding to aid units of local government solely for the purpose of rehabilitation, improvement, and construction projects for community water systems to provide safe and clean drinking water. Funds have been appropriated for FY 2024-2025 for the CWEF program. The per parish allocation amount is $350,000. 

Eligible Applicants

All municipalities and parishes within the state of Louisiana that are identified by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development as non-entitlement communities are eligible to apply for assistance.

Eligible Activities

Funds awarded can only be used for rehabilitation, improvement, and construction projects for community water systems. Reasonable engineering costs (10% of grant award for basic engineering services if associated with construction and 3% for inspection services) are also eligible.

Ineligible Activities
Previously incurred debt, improvements to private property, on-going salaries, overtime for government employees, administration, engineering-only or planning-only projects are not eligible activities under this program. Fire hydrants-only will also be ineligible.  Fire hydrants must be included within a water line rehabilitation or extension project. Generators, hand/power tools, water line locators, heavy-duty equipment used for digging, all chemicals, and incidental supplies are not eligible.

Grant Amounts
Maximum grant ceiling amounts are based on the following population ranges: 

Villages (1-999) up to $25,000.
Towns (1,000-4,999) up to $35,000.
Cities (5,000-35,000) up to $50,000.
Parishes up to $100,000.  (If a parish’s incorporated communities’ combined maximum ceiling amounts are less than the allocation for the entire parish area, the parish can then apply for more than $100,000.)

Rules
Click here for the Administrative Rules for CWEF published in accordance with Act 513 of the 2008 Regular Legislative Session and Administrative Procedures Act in January, 2020.

Application

Applications, except for emergencies, will only be accepted through the online portal. The portal and the access form to the portal can be found on the Application and Forms page. 

Forms

All forms for this program can be found under Application and Forms.