The $2.5 million is a shared pool, not an allocation for each community. County and municipal governments and federally or state-recognized tribes within the 20 Coastal Area Management Act counties may apply. This is not a household repair-grant application. Applicants need completed RCCP planning and community-engagement work, or an equivalent process, and an identified priority project.
For local governments, the first decision is whether the project needs design work or is ready for construction. Phase 3 can fund engineering, design and related work to advance a nature-based resilience project; its anticipated awards are roughly $25,000 to $750,000. Phase 4 anticipates roughly $50,000 to $750,000 for implementation. Neither range is a formal maximum, but the state warns that larger requests will be harder to accommodate. No required cash or in-kind match applies.
A construction application needs more than a place on a planning list. The Phase 4 guidance requires earlier planning and design work or its equivalent, a maintenance and monitoring plan, and a site-control form. It also calls for records showing that the appropriate governing body has approved or been made aware of the project. Applicants without present site control must explain how they will obtain it; completed projects require permanent conservation protection.
Use the separate Phase 3 or Phase 4 application materials linked from the official notice, and rank the projects if sending more than one proposal. The RFA documents direct completed submissions to rccp@deq.nc.gov by November 10 at 5 p.m. Confirm the timezone with program staff rather than assuming it. The program overview contains an extra dot in one rendering of that email address; the address above follows both RFA documents. Awards are not permission to start immediately: DEQ requires a contract signed by both parties before work begins.