Section 1 Short title
This Act may be cited as the “21st Century Federal Writers’ Project Act”.
21st Century Federal Writers’ Project Act
A BILL
To establish a grant program in the Department of Labor to assist unemployed and under-employed workers to document the American experience.
Sec. 2 Findings
Congress finds the following:
In 1935, during the Great Depression, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt established The Federal Writers’ Project of the New Deal Era. This program was organized to employ writers, editors, historians, researchers, journalists, librarians, broadcasters, photographers, and others to document American society.
The Federal Writers Project employed up to 10,000 people between its founding in 1935 during the Great Depression and the publication of its first guides in 1943.
The original Federal Writers’ Project had many successes, such as—
the American Guide Series, which covered 48 States, 40 cities, 18 regions and territories, and countless counties, with John Steinbeck calling the Series, “the most comprehensive account of the United States ever got together, and nothing since has even approached it. It was compiled during the depression by the best writers in America”;
creating opportunities for writers who went on to become some of the United States greatest authors, including Ralph Ellison, Richard Wright, Saul Bellow, and Zora Neale Hurston;
developing the Slave Narrative Project, the largest project to document the experience of formerly enslaved people, as part of the oral history and photography project telling the story of 10,000 people of the United States; and
creating over 1,000 books and pamphlets covering local and regional histories, folklore collections, humor, ethnic studies, and nature studies.
Between late 2019 and May 2022, more than 360 newspapers closed and the country is on track to lose more than one-third of its total newspapers by 2025.
Around 7 percent of America’s counties are without a local news outlet.
The original Federal Writers’ Project provided the opportunity to observe and document the Great Depression as part of a larger portrait of American society. The 21st Century Federal Writers’ Project will serve to update this portrait of American society in the 21st Century.
Sec. 3 DOL grant program
In general— Not later than 180 days after the date of enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Labor, working through the Employment and Training Administration, shall establish a grant program to provide eligible entities described in subsection (d) with funds to assist individuals who are unemployed or underemployed in order to document in writing and images the current state of the American experience.
Interagency working group—
Establishment— There is established an interagency working group for the purpose of developing the program’s guidelines.
Members— The interagency working group shall be composed of the following members:
The Secretary.
The Chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
The Librarian of Congress.
Experts in the field of journalism.
Any other experts the Secretary determines to be appropriate.
Reports— The working group shall issue a report on the composition of the working group and how the program will be structured, how grant recipients are determined, and another report following disbursement on efficacy and lessons learned.
Termination— The working group shall terminate not later than 180 days after the date on which the final grant under this program is disbursed.
Grant features— In administering the grant program under subsection (a), the Secretary shall determine—
the parameters of the grant program; and
the amount and duration of grant awards under the program, except that in no case may an individual grant awarded under the program for a fiscal year exceed an amount equal to 7.5 percent of the amounts appropriated under subsection (j) for such fiscal year.
Eligible entities— To be eligible to receive a grant under this section, an entity shall submit an application to the Secretary of Labor at such time and in such manner as the Secretary may require and be—
a nonprofit organization that has experience in writing, researching, collecting, curating, or disseminating educational information;
a newsroom, which may be a nonprofit or for-profit entity;
a public or nonprofit library; or
a communications labor organization or guild.
Preference for certain individuals— In selecting individuals to receive funds, a grant recipient shall give preference to individuals who have experience or education in an occupation described in the Standard Occupational Classification for categories 25–000 and 27–000.
Geographic diversity— In selecting the recipients for a grant under this section, the Secretary of Labor shall, to the extent practicable, ensure equitable geographic distribution, including urban and rural areas and Tribal lands.
Repository—
In general— The Secretary of Labor shall establish a repository of works developed through the grant program, in which grant recipients submit completed works from subgrant recipients, give credit to each writer or artist of the completed work, and make such works available to the public.
Timing— Not later than 90 days after receipt of a completed work under paragraph (1), the Secretary of Labor shall forward such work to the Librarian of Congress to archive such material in accordance with subsection (g).
Archive— The Librarian of Congress shall establish an archive program in the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress to collect the written and visual works collected by the Secretary under subsection (f) and make such works publicly available in a digital and print format, which format includes giving credit to each work’s writer or artist.
Reporting requirements—
Grant recipient reporting— The Secretary of Labor shall develop reporting guidelines for grant recipients under this section to include, at a minimum, information regarding—
the amount of funds received by each grant recipient, the amount provided to subgrant recipients, and the number of projects completed;
the race, ethnicity, age, location in terms of urban or rural, and regional diversity of subgrant recipients;
the number of requests made to review the completed projects or works distributed (when available); and
such other data as the Secretary considers important.
Reporting to Congress— Not less than once each year while the program under this section is in operation, the Secretary of Labor shall submit a report summarizing the data collected under paragraph (1) to the Committees on Appropriations and Education and Labor of the House of Representatives and the Committees on Appropriations and Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions of the Senate.
Administrative costs—
Secretary— The Secretary of Labor may reserve 5 percent of the funds made available to carry out the program under this section for administrative costs.
Eligible entities— An eligible entity that receives a grant under this section for a fiscal year may reserve not more than 10 percent of funds received for such year to administer its program under the grant.
Authorization of appropriations— There is authorized to be appropriated to carry out this section $60,000,000 for fiscal year 2024.