The Roles of the US Commission and Federal Interagency Council on Social Impact Partnerships
Welcome back to SIPPRA week! If you are new to this series, be sure to check out Monday’s blog post with FAQs from the NOFA, Tuesday’s blog post with a tool for assessing projects, Wednesday’s post with considerations for costs and evaluations, and yesterday’s post with our early childhood education toolkit.
As you consider a potential application for awards under the Social Impact Partnership Pay for Results Act (SIPPRA), you may be wondering who will be overseeing this process and what the roles will be in doing so. To answer this question, the SIPPRA legislation created two bodies, the US Commission on Social Impact Partnerships (SIPPRA Commission) and the Federal Interagency Council on Social Impact Partnerships (Interagency Council), to help with the review of applications and ensure that applications contain the appropriate methodologies and components.
The SIPPRA Commission
The nine-member SIPPRA Commission exists to assist the U.S. Department of Treasury review and select applications for funding and feasibility. According to the NOFA, Treasury will first provide a basic review of all applicants to ensure that they are meeting basic eligibility requirements. Then, a panel of subject-matter experts from the private or public sector review applications for outcomes funding. After the panel reviews and scores applications, Treasury will review application scores for consistency and may reject applications regardless of the applicant’s total score. Then the SIPPRA Commission will review applications and make award recommendations to Treasury.
The SIPPRA Commission is comprised of non-federal individuals from the private sector, with a Chair appointed by the President and eight members appointed by Congressional leaders. In July, we posted an update on the SIPPRA Commission. Now eight of the nine individuals have been appointed to the SIPPRA Commission:
| 1. Paul Edgerley (Chair of Commission), Senior Advisor, Private Equity, Bain Capital |
| Appointed by President Trump, announced June 6, 2018 |
| 2. William S. Simon, Senior Advisor, KKR & Co. Inc. |
| Appointed by Senate Majority Leader McConnell, July 19, 2018 |
| 3. Donald R. Cohen, Executive Director, In the Public Interest |
| Appointed by Senate Minority Leader Schumer, July 9, 2018 |
| 4. James X. Sullivan, Professor of Economics, University of Notre Dame |
| Appointed by Speaker Ryan, announced July 3, 2018 |
| 5. Anne Wilson, CEO, United Way Bay Area |
| Appointed by House Minority Leader Pelosi, announced May 29, 2018 |
| 6. Jeremy Keele, former Chairman and CEO, Sorenson Impact Foundation |
| Appointed by Senate Finance Chair Hatch, announced June 12, 2018 |
| 7. Harlan Yu, Executive Director, Upturn |
| Appointed by Senate Finance Ranking Member Wyden, announced June 8, 2018 |
| 8. Awaiting confirmation |
| Appointed by House Ways and Means Committee Chair Brady |
| 9. Kimberly Lee, Vice President of Resource Development and Branding, Mental Health Association, Inc. |
| Appointed by House Ways and Means Committee Ranking Member Neal, announced June 26, 2018 |
Interagency Council
The Interagency Council is an eleven-member council, chaired by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget Director. The remaining ten members consist of representatives from the U.S. Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, Agriculture, Justice, Housing and Urban Development, Education, Veterans Affairs, Treasury, the Social Security Administration, and the Corporation for National Community Service.
The Interagency Council has ten specific responsibilities (42 U.S.C. 1397n-5), including advising and assisting the Secretary of the Treasury in the development and implementation of SIPPRA projects. Key to the Interagency Council’s responsibilities is to certify that applications “contain rigorous, independent data and reliable, evidence-based research methodologies.” They will also review each application’s assumptions about federal cost savings and judge whether a project will yield savings to the federal government if the project achieves its outcomes.
Once projects are selected, the Interagency Council will certify to the Secretary that each state or local government (and corresponding evaluator) that has launched a project has access to the federal administrative data they will need to evaluate the project’s performance and outcomes.
For more resources to guide you in your SIPPRA application, be sure to consult the Urban Institute’s full SIPPRA week blog series and SIPPRA page. Next week, the blog series will wrap up with a summary of the resources the Urban Institute can provide to potential SIPPRA applicants, and on Thursday, February 28th, please join us for a webinar to learn more about these new federal funding opportunities for PFS projects. Our team will review key takeaways from the SIPPRA NOFA and answer your questions about PFS.
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As an organization, the Urban Institute does not take positions on issues. Scholars are independent and empowered to share their evidence-based views and recommendations shaped by research. Photo via Infogram.