Lathrup Village receives cybersecurity grant

LATHRUP VILLAGE — Lathrup Village has been awarded a $21,678 cybersecurity grant through the fiscal year 2024 State and Local Cybersecurity Grant Program.

The city of Lathrup Village was notified that it received the grant on Feb. 13. The grant, administered by the Michigan State Police, Emergency Management and Homeland Security Division, and funded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, will be used to strengthen Lathrup Village’s cybersecurity and protect municipal systems from cyber threats. The funding from the grant will be used for multifactor authentication and migration of the city website from a .org to a .gov domain. The grant will pay for it all.

The performance period for the grant will last through Sept. 30, 2028. City Administrator Mike Greene said that this will give the city enough time to slowly implement these changes.

“We can take our time and make sure everything is budgeted for,” Greene said.

Greene said these two initiatives are simple ways the city can protect itself from cybersecurity attacks or phishing attempts.

Lathrup Village applied for the grant approximately 10 to 12 months before receiving it. According to Clayton Cummins, public information officer for the Michigan State Police, Emergency Management and Homeland Security Division, this is a longer-than-usual timeline. He said many factors can be attributed to the delay, including a federal funding freeze in early 2025 and the government shutdown from Oct. 1 to Nov. 12, 2025. Additionally, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency was also delayed in its grant reviews and approvals.

The grant that Lathrup Village received is competitively based. Cummins said Lathrup Village’s application was among 550 applications received by the Emergency Management and Homeland Security Division. Lathrup Village was chosen based on its application’s score.

“Cybersecurity is essential for local municipalities because they operate the critical systems residents depend on every day, such as public safety communications, utilities, financial systems and community services, while also safeguarding sensitive citizen data,” Cummins said.

Currently, the city is waiting for the paperwork associated with the grant to be finalized, so these initiatives have yet to begin being implemented. Greene said the city expects to start implementing cybersecurity changes in about a month.