Job stability?

Okay, I'm beginning to get a bit nervous now. Last week our business manager asked me if I had begun the renewal process for my grant. I said "never done it before - what do I need to do?"

So I was able to find the appropiate website and login information to begin. The problem is that I can't do it yet because the grant is still "Pending administration review".

This grant will keep me employed for another year. Yet, I have reason to be nervous as to why it's still under review.

My PI has cancer. He's already long beaten the odds by having it over a year, and is doing better than he was a year ago. We kept it under wraps to granting agencies because we didn't want the funding pulled. Yet, this agency did call me right before the holiday break and asked me "we heard some rumors that he's sick - is he able to do his job".

I politely said "yes, why don't you ask him" and connected him. Don't know how they found out, but after a year, it's hard to keep it a secret. I have a couple ideas, but unless I get further proof, I'm not going to confront anyone.

Then they started to nitpick the budget. My PI got a series of emails a week ago asking why we replaced one graduate student with another (grad students come and go - hello). I thought it was cleared up, but the status still hasn't changed.

Now I'm getting nervous. I'll go find the manager later this morning, and ask her to bug the contacts on the administration list as to what is the holdup. Generally, this agency is good about having the funds available at the start date (which is February 1).

It's entirely possible that I'm being paranoid. It could be that the review is underway because this agency has had its budget slashed. We already were told by NASA that they will not support our grant for the third year as promised because of its "change of focus" (aka: budget cuts).