When President Joe Biden passed the Inflation Reduction Act a year ago, Adrien Salazar was skeptical.

The landmark climate bill includes $60bn for environmental justice investments – money he had fought for, as policy director for the leading US climate advocacy coalition Grassroots Global Justice Alliance (GGJA).

But after much discussion, the grassroots group realized they did not have the resources to chase after IRA funding. It would have to hire new staff and develop a specific program to apply for grants to access those funds. The coalition is stretched thin as is: organizing local and state campaigns, leading community engagement, and planning youth programming. GGJA decided it won’t apply to funding opportunities at all.

“It is not within our capacity to try to build a program that helps our members access federal funding. We just don’t have the capacity to do that,” Salazar said. Many employees lack the time or know-how to take on grant opportunities.

“We’re a national organization. How can we imagine a small organization that’s doing neighborhood, grassroots-level door knocking to have the capacity to also navigate the federal bureaucracy?”