Proposals are officially invited for the landmark Call for Proposals - Rockefeller Foundation Cities Deliver: AI Solutions for Public Services 2026. Backed by a historic $50 million joint commitment from The Rockefeller Foundation and the OpenAI Foundation (managed by RF Catalytic Capital), this global initiative awards transformative grants ranging from $500,000 to $2,000,000 USD to organizations working in direct partnership with municipal city governments to deploy artificial intelligence for public welfare.
Nearly half of the world’s population lives in urban areas, where municipal services directly determine whether families access essential healthcare, find meaningful employment, navigate social safety nets, and survive environmental shocks. Cities Deliver aims to empower city administrations and civic tech innovators to leverage frontier artificial intelligence responsibly, targeting a collective reach of up to 100 million urban residents worldwide across Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and Oceania.
Application deadline: November 29, 2026 at 11:59 PM Eastern Time (ET). The call is open to global nonprofits, university research labs, public benefit corporations, and charitable initiatives with an official letter of commitment from a municipal city partner.
Quick Facts - Rockefeller Foundation Cities Deliver 2026
| Detail | Information |
|---|---|
| Convening Bodies | The Rockefeller Foundation & OpenAI Foundation |
| Management Entity | RF Catalytic Capital (RFCC) |
| Global Commitment | $50 Million USD Total Initiative Fund |
| Individual Grant Size | $500,000 to $2,000,000 USD over 24 months |
| Grant Tracks | Seed Track ($500K to <$1M) & Scale Track ($1M to $2M) |
| Target Cohort | Up to 50 partner organizations globally |
| Target Beneficiary Reach | Up to 100 million city residents globally |
| Eligible Lead Entities | Nonprofits, university labs, public benefit corporations, and charitable projects |
| Mandatory Partner | Municipal City Government (Letter of Intent required) |
| Geographic Scope | Global (All world regions except OFAC-sanctioned countries) |
| AI Technology Scope | Platform-agnostic (OpenAI, Anthropic, open-source, or proprietary frontier models) |
| Application Deadline | November 29, 2026 (11:59 PM ET) |
| Official Portal | citiesdeliver.rockefellerfoundation.org |
Four Thematic Focus Areas
Proposals must focus on improving access to and quality of public services for vulnerable, low-income, or historically underserved communities within one of four domains:
- Public Health: Deploying AI systems that expand the reach, equity, and diagnostic readiness of municipal public health systems. Key sub-areas include frontline primary care support, predictive disease surveillance, mental health triage, disability accessibility services, and neighborhood food security and nutrition delivery.
- Economic Mobility: Harnessing AI to bridge systemic employment and welfare gaps. Key sub-areas include conversational benefit enrollment assistants (optimizing social welfare access), predictive career navigation and skills-based job matching, and municipal workforce training aligned with local market demand.
- Environmental Resilience: AI solutions that empower cities to forecast, withstand, and rapidly recover from climate hazards and environmental crises. Key sub-areas include predictive flood, heatwave, and storm modeling, emergency services dispatch optimization, smart energy and grid resilience, and urban land management in hazard-prone neighborhoods.
- Civic Engagement & Service Delivery: Tools that enable local municipal administrations to proactively reach residents and dramatically compress response times. Key sub-areas include multilingual resident query routing, digital connectivity, administrative court case navigation, and automated municipal permitting and regulatory workflows. (Note: Projects involving elections, voter registration, or political campaigns are strictly excluded.)
Grant Tracks: Seed vs. Scale
Cities Deliver supports AI innovations across two maturity tiers, both funded over a 24-month duration:
- Seed Track ($500,000 to <$1,000,000 USD): For early-stage concepts seeking to develop, prototype, and conduct an initial real-world pilot in a municipal city setting. Grantees receive funding to co-design solutions with city partners, test safety and usability with real residents, and assess baseline feasibility for broader municipal integration.
- Scale Track ($1,000,000 to $2,000,000 USD): For solutions that have already completed a successful city pilot, generated demonstrable service improvements, and are ready for expansion. Funds support extending the solution across additional municipal agencies, broader urban neighborhoods, or replicating the deployment into partner cities with a sustainable path to public financing.
Comprehensive Grantee Benefits
Beyond direct non-dilutive grant capital, selected partner organizations receive a robust acceleration ecosystem:
- Substantial Grant Financing: 50% disbursed upon contract signing and 50% upon verified completion of 12-month mid-term milestones.
- Facilitated Peer Learning: Direct participation in curated global cohorts organized by region, technology archetype, and focus area, supplemented by expert webinars and M&E guidance.
- Ad-Hoc Technical Consultation: Periodic access to leading AI product, machine learning, and systems architecture advisors from The Rockefeller Foundation and OpenAI Foundation networks.
- High-Level Multilateral Visibility: Global spotlight features across Rockefeller Foundation and OpenAI Foundation communications, international policy summits, and civic leadership networks.
- Global Convening Invitation: Fully funded participation in an exclusive international or regional Cities Deliver summit to showcase results to mayors, international development funders, and civic tech leaders.
Eligibility Criteria
To qualify for consideration under the Cities Deliver Open Call, applications must satisfy all institutional requirements:
- Eligible Lead Applicant: Must be a registered non-profit organization (including university departments, academic labs, and fiscally sponsored non-profits) or a public benefit corporation. For-profit technology enterprises may qualify only under restricted circumstances where the project serves a strictly charitable purpose with no more than incidental private benefit. National or state governments may not apply directly as lead applicants.
- Mandatory City Government Partner: Every lead organization must formally partner with a designated municipal city government agency (such as a Mayor’s Office, Department of Public Health, Department of Transportation, or Chief Technology Officer) and submit an official Letter of Intent or equivalent commitment memo.
- Charitable Purpose & Equity: Projects must be designed to benefit poor, distressed, or underserved urban populations, advancing social equity and public welfare.
- Meaningful Frontier AI Integration: The core solution must integrate recent frontier generative AI capabilities (multimodal language, computer vision, advanced reasoning, automated workflows) working in harmony with existing municipal databases and public software stacks.
- Platform Agnostic: Grantees have complete freedom to choose whichever AI models, proprietary platforms, or open-source foundation tools (OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Llama, Mistral, etc.) best address their city's specific requirements.
- Responsible AI Safeguards: Applicants must demonstrate robust privacy, data security, anti-bias, and algorithmic transparency protocols appropriate for sensitive municipal operations.
Selection & Evaluation Criteria
Proposals will be screened and evaluated against seven core criteria:
- Demonstrated City Demand: Genuine commitment and active pull from city government leadership and frontline community members.
- Problem-First Orientation: Addressing an acute, prioritized public sector challenge rather than applying technology for technology’s sake.
- Technical Feasibility & AI Fit: Thoughtful, frontier AI architecture with realistic technical assumptions.
- Implementation Readiness: Capacity of the multidisciplinary team to execute software development and public sector integration smoothly.
- Institutional Sustainability: Clear roadmap for long-term municipal adoption, follow-on civil funding, and operational longevity beyond the 24-month grant.
- Responsible AI Governance: Rigorous attention to ethical guidelines, data privacy, user consent, and human-in-the-loop oversight.
- Rigorous Learning & Evaluation: A quantifiable methodology for assessing social impact, resident satisfaction, and service delivery acceleration.
Application Process & Key Deadlines
The selection process follows a structured multi-stage review:
- October 14, 2026: Call for Proposals opens globally.
- October 31, 2026 (11:59 PM ET): Deadline to submit applicant questions to citiesdeliver@rockfound.org.
- November 4, 2026: Consolidated applicant FAQ updates published on the portal.
- November 29, 2026 (11:59 PM ET): Round 1 Submission Deadline (Eligibility screening questionnaire, Round 1 narrative proposal, legal documentation, city Letter of Intent, and a short 3-minute video pitch).
- December 2026: Round 1 evaluations completed; shortlisted applicants invited to schedule January interviews.
- January 2027: 45-minute virtual technical and leadership interviews with Rockefeller Foundation and OpenAI Foundation advisors.
- February 2027: Finalist notification and invitation to submit comprehensive Round 2 Proposals (detailed budget, audited financials, municipal MOU, and technical audits).
- March 1, 2027: Round 2 Proposals deadline.
- April 2027: Final grant awards announced; contract execution and project commencement.
How to Apply
- Visit the official application gateway on citiesdeliver.rockefellerfoundation.org.
- Complete the preliminary Eligibility Screening Questionnaire.
- Draft your Round 1 Proposal using the official template, clearly defining problem scale, city partnership dynamics, and technical architecture.
- Obtain a formal signed Letter of Intent from your municipal city government partner.
- Record and upload a concise 3-minute video presenting your team and demonstrating your AI solution concept.
- Upload your legal status documentation and submit prior to November 29, 2026, 11:59 PM Eastern Time.
Official Sources & Inquiries
Apply on Cities Deliver Official Application Portal
The Rockefeller Foundation & OpenAI Official Partnership Announcement
OpenAI Foundation Initiative Overview
Direct inquiries may be sent via email to: citiesdeliver@rockround.org.
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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Can a city government apply directly on its own?
No. City governments cannot be the direct fiscal recipient of the grant. The lead applicant must be an eligible nonprofit organization, university research lab, or public benefit corporation working in close, documented partnership with the city government.
Are applicants required to use OpenAI models or tools?
No. The initiative is strictly platform-agnostic. Applicants are completely free to utilize any leading commercial foundation model (including OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, etc.) or open-source AI architecture that best serves the city’s technical infrastructure and local language needs.
What city sizes are eligible to participate?
Cities of all sizes are eligible, from mid-sized metropolitan centers to megacities, across high-, middle-, and low-income countries. What matters is the credibility of the partnership, the scale of resident impact, and the replicability of the solution.
Can existing Rockefeller Foundation grantees apply?
Yes. Current and former grantees of The Rockefeller Foundation and RF Catalytic Capital (RFCC) are fully eligible to apply through the open call.
How are grant disbursements structured over the 24 months?
Grants are released in two tranches: 50% upon initial grant execution and orientation, and the remaining 50% upon successful evaluation of the 12-month mid-term milestones.
