Article provided by Craig O'Neill
Many funding agencies require the Project Director/Principal Investigator (PD/PI) and any other senior personnel to disclose their active and pending projects by completing and submitting a “Current and Pending Support” (CPS) form with their proposals. The instructions to complete a CPS are usually found in the request for proposal (RFP) or the sponsor’s published proposal guidelines. Generally, the form requires disclosing budgeted effort on the pending proposal, all committed effort on current projects, and anticipated effort on proposed projects, regardless of source (e.g., Federal, State, local or non-U.S. government agencies, public or private foundations, industrial or other commercial organizations).
Usually the CPS form requests the following information: current and pending project/proposal title(s); current source of support; location of project(s); person-months or % of time per year committed to the project(s); pending submissions planned in the near future with an indication of previous support and a list of other sponsors to which the current proposal has been/will be submitted; and total award amount and project period covered for current project(s). Some sponsors require a confirmation that cumulative committed percentages of effort do not exceed 100% even if the individual receives no salary support from the project(s).
Generally, concurrent submissions of the proposal to multiple organizations will not prejudice its review. Any concurrent submissions should be disclosed in the pending proposal cover page and the CPS. Non-disclosure could result in a proposal rejection and the sponsor’s reviewers may see this as deceptive which could result in damage to the PD/PI’s reputation. Obviously, other issues could occur if the same exact proposal was funded multiple times.
The CPS percentage of effort can be ever changing for a flourishing PD/PI. When the PD/PI has successive awards, he/she will need to re-review their percentage of effort for future proposals based on the additional amount of time that they are working on each sponsored project.
The bottom line: The PD/PI should actively refresh their CPS and follow the sponsor’s RFP or published proposal guidelines when completing the CPS. Please contact OSP when the instructions are not clear.
