Grants and infrastructure funding for small towns

Where can small-town officials find grants and infrastructure funding?

Small-town officials find most grant and infrastructure funding through five sources. Most of it arrives through the state. USDA Rural Development funds community facilities, water systems, and economic development in rural places. States pass federal Community Development Block Grant money to smaller communities through their own competitions. State revolving funds pay for water and sewer projects. State agencies run grants for roads, parks, public safety, and downtowns. Community foundations fund local projects inside their own region.

Last reviewed November 9, 2026.

Where the money sits

USDA Rural Development: The Community Facilities program funds buildings and equipment such as fire trucks, clinics, libraries, and town halls in rural areas of 20,000 people or fewer. It offers grants, direct loans, and loan guarantees. The smallest and lowest-income towns get the largest grant share. Water and Waste Disposal programs fund drinking water, sewer, and storm drainage.
State-run Community Development Block Grants: Larger cities get CDBG money from HUD directly. Smaller towns apply to their state, which runs its own competition for infrastructure, housing, and economic development projects. Each state publishes its own method and deadlines. Many states post their method of distribution early in the year with the scoring rules a small town needs to plan its application around.
Water and sewer revolving funds: Every state runs a Clean Water and a Drinking Water State Revolving Fund with EPA money. Most of the help comes as low-interest loans. Many states forgive part of the principal for small or disadvantaged communities.
State agencies: Transportation, parks, public safety, tourism, and economic development departments each run grant cycles of their own. They are often smaller than federal programs and less crowded.
Community and corporate foundations: A community foundation funds projects inside its region, such as parks, libraries, and youth programs. Local utilities and large employers often have foundations that give in the towns where they operate.

Infrastructure funding for small towns

Roads, water lines, broadband, and public buildings each have their own funders. Most reach a small town through the state.

Water, sewer, and storm drainage: USDA Water and Waste Disposal grants and loans for rural towns, and the state’s Clean Water and Drinking Water revolving funds.
Roads, bridges, and sidewalks: Federal highway money reaches small towns through the state department of transportation, which runs its own calls for local projects such as transportation alternatives and safety improvements.
Broadband: State broadband offices run the grant rounds that carry federal broadband money to local projects.
Public buildings and equipment: USDA Community Facilities covers town halls, fire stations, clinics, and libraries in rural areas of 20,000 people or fewer.
Infrastructure that brings jobs: The Economic Development Administration’s Public Works program funds infrastructure tied to private investment and jobs in distressed communities.

Where to look for open funding opportunities

Each source posts its own calls. These are the places a town official checks.

Your USDA Rural Development state office: Each state office lists its Community Facilities and Water and Waste Disposal programs and has staff who help small towns put applications together.
Your state’s CDBG administrator: Usually the state commerce or community affairs department. Its yearly method of distribution sets the deadlines and scoring rules for small-town CDBG projects.
Your state revolving fund programs: The state environmental or health department runs the Clean Water and Drinking Water funds and publishes a priority list each year. Getting a project onto that list comes first.
Your state DOT and broadband office: Calls for local road, sidewalk, safety, and broadband projects come from these offices, often on a yearly cycle.
Your council of governments or regional planning commission: Regional councils track open programs for their member towns, and many help write and manage the applications.
Grants.gov: Federal programs that fund towns directly, such as EDA Public Works, post their announcements here.

Find them without a grants office

Most small towns run grants from the clerk’s or manager’s office, alongside everything else on the desk. Quillify searches 4,900+ open grants across federal, state, and private funders and shows which ones a town your size can apply for. It reads each announcement and tells you where you stand before anyone starts writing. A town clerk who also handles payroll and council minutes can see every program open to a town that size in one list without checking a dozen state agency websites.

Pick a program and Quillify drafts the application from your town’s own documents, such as plans, budgets, and past applications. It scores the draft against the announcement before you submit. Quillify for cities and towns.

Where to go from here

The landscape above is the same whoever you are. What Quillify does about it is not.

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