Grant Eligibility: 'Only If', 'Unless', and a Chair Who Skips Both
Ridgeway Foundation's grant rules read: "An application is eligible only if the applicant has audited accounts for each of the two most recent financial years and operates in at least three districts. Eligible applications scoring above 70 are funded, unless the requested budget exceeds 200,000, in which case the board reviews the application before any decision." The foundation has no discretion to waive eligibility criteria.
Application 1: audited accounts for 2022 and 2023 (2021 unaudited); active in four districts; score 74; budget 240,000; submitted on time.
Application 2: audited accounts for 2021, 2022 and 2023; active in two districts; score 78; budget 150,000.
The panel chair announces that Application 1 is "approved, since 74 clears the threshold and the two-year audit rule is met," and that Application 2 is "referred to the board for a decision because of its strong score." A board member asks the program officer to confirm both outcomes before decision letters go out.
1. Classify both applications and state the correct outcome for each.
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Application 1 - eligible, but not yet decided. Audits for 2022 and 2023 are the two most recent years, and four districts clears the minimum of three. Score 74 exceeds 70. But the budget of 240,000 exceeds the 200,000 ceiling, which triggers board review "before any decision." The correct status is referred to the board, not approved. Referral is not a favourable outcome; the board may still decline.
Application 2 - ineligible. Two districts fall below the required three, and there is no discretion to waive that. Three years of audited accounts do not cure a district shortfall, and a score of 78 cannot, because scoring only operates on applications that have already passed eligibility. The correct letter is a decline on eligibility grounds.
Note also that referral is unavailable here: the board-review clause applies to eligible applications over budget, so the chair's proposed route for Application 2 does not exist.
2. The chair says: "The rule says above 70 is funded, so the budget is irrelevant once you have 74." Rebut this using the sentence structure.
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The chair has read half of one sentence. The funding rule has three parts:
- "Eligible applications scoring above 70 are funded" - the funding outcome applies only to applications that are already eligible.
- "unless the requested budget exceeds 200,000" - an exception carved out of that same outcome.
- "in which case the board reviews the application before any decision" - the consequence of the exception.
Because the unless clause sits inside the same sentence as the funding rule, it qualifies that rule; it is not a later amendment that a high score can outrank. A score of 74 makes funding the default, and the budget displaces the default. "Before any decision" also forecloses the chair's wording: approval cannot be announced, because announcing it is the decision the clause postpones.
The separate error is treating "eligible only if" as though it read "if." Only if marks necessary conditions; meeting them does not entitle the applicant to anything, it merely keeps the application in play.
3. Restate the rule as a decision sequence a program officer could apply without argument.
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Step 1 - Eligibility (no discretion, decline if failed):
- Audited accounts for each of the two most recent financial years?
- Active in at least three districts?
- If either fails → decline as ineligible. Do not score, do not refer.
Step 2 - Score (eligible applications only):
- Score above 70 → proceed to Step 3.
- Score 70 or below → decline.
Step 3 - Budget test:
- Requested budget of 200,000 or less → fund.
- Requested budget above 200,000 → refer to the board; no decision may be issued until the board has reviewed.
Applied: Application 1 passes Steps 1 and 2, then goes to board review at Step 3 - status referred. Application 2 fails Step 1 - status declined, ineligible.
Writing the rule as a sequence removes the two failure modes seen here: treating one necessary condition as sufficient, and reading an exception as subordinate to the outcome it excepts.