You will need to establish a way to document the amount of time the staff person spent on activities supported under the grant. Generally, this would be some kind of timekeeping system that documented all the hours the employee worked and allocated hours to different cost centers, such as the CARES grant, the Election Security grant, etc. 

Yes, OMB has eased administrative requirements on grantees under the pandemic and EAC can delay the process to negotiate a rate with grantees. You may claim the rate as part of your match and negotiate at a later date.

Yes, you bought those supplies to respond to the pandemic as a preventive measure. They are still a legitimate match to the grant. 

The state will have to pay back the portion of expended federal funds for which they could not meet the match, e.g. if you received and expended $5,000,000 under the CARES Act and were able to provide $800,000 in match, you were able to match $4,000,000 of the total. You would only have to pay back the appropriate portion of the expended funds to make up the match shortfall. In these cases, EAC will work with the state to determine the amount owed. 

HAVA, in Section 101(b)(2), specifically states that 101 funds cannot be used to pay costs associated with any litigation, except to the extent that such costs otherwise constitute permitted uses of a payment under this section.  Therefore, they cannot be used to cover the costs of a lawsuit brought against an action the state takes such as moving a primary or changing voting processes.  However, if the litigation pertained to a state's actions to mitigate the effects of the pandemic on federal elections and the litigation resulted in a judgement or order requiring the state to implement certain changes in their administration of those elections, the funds could be used to carry out those required changes. 

Public Hearing Video

Yes, this is an allowable cost directly related to the pandemic.