FORTIFIED Roofing · Baldwin & Mobile County, AL
FORTIFIED and the Alabama roof grant are not the same thing
People search for a “fortified roof grant” as though it were one program. It's two: FORTIFIED is a construction standard, and Strengthen Alabama Homes is a state grant that pays for one. They have different gatekeepers, different requirements, and different lists of who's allowed to do what. Liberty is through one gate and not the other, and this page tells you exactly which — because knowing the difference is worth more to you than a roofer being vague about it.
BBB A+ · accredited since 1988 · licensed and insured in Alabama
FORTIFIED is the standard
A published, beyond-code way of building a roof, developed by IBHS and confirmed by an independent third-party evaluator. It ends in a designation certificate tied to your address — the document Alabama's mandated wind-premium credit keys off. There is no application, no lottery, and no season. Any FORTIFIED-credentialed roofer can build one for you any week of the year.
Strengthen Alabama Homes is the money
A state grant program run by the Alabama Department of Insurance that pays up to $10,000 toward getting a roof to that standard, with no income cap (as of 2026-08-17, source: Alabama Dept. of Insurance (SAH program document)). It has open dates, a funding cap, an approved-contractor list, and a stack of seven-day deadlines. It is competitive and it is worth chasing if your timing works.
Side by side
Seven questions, two different answers
Read down the column that matches what you're actually trying to do.
What is it?
FORTIFIED · the standard
A beyond-code construction standard for roofs and homes in high-wind regions. A set of requirements a house is built to.
Strengthen Alabama Homes · the grant
A state grant program that pays toward building a roof to that standard. A source of money, not a set of requirements.
Who runs it?
FORTIFIED · the standard
The Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS), a national research body funded by the insurance industry.
Strengthen Alabama Homes · the grant
Strengthen Alabama Homes, a program of the Alabama Department of Insurance, operating since 2015.
What does it cost you?
FORTIFIED · the standard
You pay for the roof and for the independent evaluation. There is no application and no waiting list.
Strengthen Alabama Homes · the grant
Nothing, if you win one — it pays up to $10,000 toward the work, with no income cap. You still pay the evaluator fee and any cost above the award.
How do you get it?
FORTIFIED · the standard
Hire a FORTIFIED-credentialed roofer, build to the requirements, and have an independent evaluator document and submit it. Any month of the year.
Strengthen Alabama Homes · the grant
Apply online the morning your county's window opens, first-come first-served, then clear a series of seven-day deadlines. Funding is capped and windows can close in minutes.
Who can do the work?
FORTIFIED · the standard
Any contractor holding a current FORTIFIED credential. You choose freely.
Strengthen Alabama Homes · the grant
Only a contractor on the state's approved-contractor list. You select three of them for bids; the program's rules govern the process.
What do you end up holding?
FORTIFIED · the standard
An IBHS designation certificate for your address — the document the Alabama premium credit keys off.
Strengthen Alabama Homes · the grant
The same designation certificate, with the state having paid part of the bill to get you there.
Where does Liberty stand?
FORTIFIED · the standard
Credentialed. Company 011483, status Compliant; provider Dane DeValk, ID R011603, Designation: Roofer, Active.
Strengthen Alabama Homes · the grant
Not a participating contractor. We are not on the state's approved list and we don't perform grant-funded work.
Why this matters
Three ways the mix-up costs homeowners money
This isn't a vocabulary lesson. Every one of these is something we've watched happen to somebody's roof.
Waiting on a window a roof can't survive
A homeowner with an actively failing roof holds out three months for the next application date, loses the lottery anyway, and by then the deck is wet and the ceiling is stained. The grant is worth chasing on a sound roof. On a leaking one, waiting is the expensive decision.
Assuming one credential implies the other
Being on the state's approved-contractor list and holding a current FORTIFIED credential are separate qualifications, and a contractor can hold either without the other. Homeowners assume a grant-list roofer is automatically credentialed, or that a credentialed roofer can automatically do grant work. Ask both questions separately and verify both answers.
Thinking the grant is the only road to the discount
This is the costliest one. Alabama's mandated wind-premium credit keys off the FORTIFIED designation itself — not off who paid for the roof. A designated roof you paid for yourself earns exactly the same credit as a designated roof the state helped fund. Homeowners who believe they need the grant to get the insurance benefit end up with neither.
The credit itself is set by statute rather than by negotiation — here is what the mandate actually says and how you claim it.
Where we stand
Through one gate, not the other
Most roofing sites would leave this fuzzy. Here it is flat.
We hold the FORTIFIED credential
Company 011483, Liberty Roofing Company Inc, status Compliant. Provider Dane DeValk, ID R011603, Designation: Roofer, Status: Active. Read live from the official directory on 2026-08-17 — and you can read it yourself right now.
We are not a grant-program contractor
Liberty is not on the Strengthen Alabama Homes approved-contractor list. That list held 21 contractors when it was checked on 2026-08-17, and we were not on it. We do not perform grant-funded work and we won't take a job on the suggestion that we might. If grant money is your plan, hire from the list.
The official approved-contractor listDon't take our word for it — look us up
Any roofer on the coast can say the word “fortified.” The FORTIFIED program keeps a public directory of every contractor and every credentialed provider, and you can search it yourself in about thirty seconds. Here is exactly what you will find when you look us up.
Open the official FORTIFIED directory- Company
- Liberty Roofing Company Inc (011483)
- Company status
- Compliant
- Credentialed provider
- Dane DeValk — ID R011603
- Designation
- Roofer — Active
Read from the FORTIFIED Verify a Pro directory on 2026-08-17. Statuses change — check it yourself before you sign anything, with us or with anybody else.
One thing we are not: your evaluator
A FORTIFIED designation is documented by an independent, third-party FORTIFIED Evaluator — a separate credential from ours, held by someone with no stake in the roof job. Liberty is the roofer. We build to the standard and we hand the evaluator the photographs and documentation the standard calls for. We do not inspect our own work for the designation, and you should be suspicious of any roofer who says they do both.
If the grant is what you want
Go get it — here's the honest route
We would rather you get $10,000 of state money toward a stronger roof than give us a job you didn't need to pay for. Set up your profile on the official site before your county's window, have your documents scanned and your disclosure form notarized in advance, and be logged in at 9:00 AM on the day. Then hire from the state's list.
The one thing to understand going in: the windows are first-come, first-served, funding is capped, and once you're in, the process is a series of tight seven-day clocks. Most applications that fail, fail on a missed deadline rather than on eligibility. Our full walkthrough of the program lives on the grant guide, and it is written to get you approved, not to get you to call us.
2026 windows, our counties
Mobile County
Jan 6 · Apr 7 · Jul 7 · Oct 6
Opens 9:00 AM
Baldwin County
Jan 8 · Apr 9 · Jul 9 · Oct 8
Opens 9:00 AM
Dates as of 2026-08-18, source: the official Grant Award Schedule. They change every cycle — confirm before you count on one.
Live scheduleThe other path
What we offer instead
If the grant isn't going to work — wrong quarter, leaking roof, or you just don't want to run a state application — the standard is still available to you, and so is everything it unlocks.
A roof built to the standard
The same requirements, the same independent evaluation, the same IBHS designation certificate at the end. Built on your schedule instead of the state's, by a credentialed roofer you can look up in the official directory.
The insurance path, spelled out
Alabama's mandated credits run 35–60% off the hurricane portion of a premium and 20–35% off the other-wind portion (Ala. Code § 27-31D-2.1). We show you how the credit actually gets claimed — and we don't quote you a dollar figure, because we can't see your policy.
Financing so timing isn't the deciding factor
Roofs fail when they fail, not when a funding window opens. Financing is available so a failing roof doesn't turn into an emergency while you wait a quarter for a grant that may not come.
Material choice is a separate decision from the designation, and both shingle and metal roofing systems can be built to the standard — what matters is the deck, the attachment, and the edges underneath whatever you pick. If a storm is what put you here, start with a documented storm inspection — a claim and a designation are two different conversations, and doing them in the right order matters.
Common questions
FORTIFIED vs. the grant — questions
- Is a FORTIFIED roof the same thing as the Alabama roof grant?
- No, and this is the single most common mix-up on the Gulf Coast. FORTIFIED is a construction standard issued by IBHS — a way of building a roof, confirmed by an independent evaluator, that ends in a designation certificate. Strengthen Alabama Homes is a state grant program that pays toward building a roof to that standard. One is the specification; the other is a source of funding for it. You can have a FORTIFIED roof with no grant at all, and the grant exists only to produce FORTIFIED roofs.
- Is Liberty Roofing a Strengthen Alabama Homes contractor?
- No. Liberty is not on the state's approved-contractor list, and we say so plainly rather than letting the wording blur. When that list was checked on 2026-08-17 it held 21 contractors and Liberty was not among them. If your plan is to use grant money, you need a roofer from that list — it's published on the official program site and we link straight to it.
- But you are FORTIFIED-certified?
- Yes, and those are two different gates. In the official FORTIFIED directory, Liberty Roofing Company Inc is company 011483 with a status of Compliant, and Dane DeValk is a credentialed provider, ID R011603, Designation: Roofer, Status: Active (read live 2026-08-17). Holding the credential is about the standard. Being on the state list is about the grant program. A roofer can hold one, both, or neither, and a homeowner should ask about them separately.
- Why isn't Liberty on the grant contractor list?
- It's a deliberate choice, not a rejection. Grant work runs on the program's calendar, the program's bidding process, and the program's paperwork, and it moves at the speed of a state funding cycle. We build to the FORTIFIED standard on the homeowner's timeline instead — which means we can start when your roof needs starting rather than when a window opens. If the grant is the right path for you, we'd rather point you at it cleanly than pretend we're something we're not.
- Should I chase the grant or just build the roof?
- Depends entirely on your roof's clock. The grant is real money — up to $10,000, no income cap (as of 2026-08-17) — and if your roof is sound enough to wait for a window, it's worth pursuing. If your roof is leaking now, if you've already missed the quarter, or if you don't want to run a competitive state application with seven-day deadlines attached, building to the standard directly gets you the same designation certificate and the same mandated insurance credit, just without the state paying part of it.
- How do I check what a roofer actually holds?
- Ask two separate questions and verify both yourself. First: what's your FORTIFIED provider ID, and can I look it up in the official directory? Second: are you on the Strengthen Alabama Homes approved-contractor list? Both answers are publicly checkable in about a minute, and a roofer who gets vague about either one has told you something useful.
Keep reading
Related reading
The standard, the money, and the coastal reality that makes either one worth the trouble.
What a FORTIFIED roof is
The three levels, what the standard requires, and what drives the cost.
Read itFORTIFIED insurance discount
The mandated Alabama credits, the endorsement explained, and how to claim it.
Read itThe Alabama roof grant
The full Strengthen Alabama Homes walkthrough, deadlines and all.
Read itRoof replacement
What a standard tear-off and rebuild includes, start to finish.
Read itGulf Coast storm data
The NOAA hail, wind, and hurricane record for Baldwin and Mobile County.
Read itRoof insurance claims
What your policy owes you after a storm, and how the claim process runs.
Read itTalk to a FORTIFIED-credentialed roofer
Not sure which path is yours?
Tell us the shape of your roof problem and your timeline. If the grant is your best move we'll say so and point you at the list. If it isn't, we'll tell you what building to the standard would take on your house — and either way you'll leave the conversation knowing more than when you started.
BBB A+ · accredited since 1988 · licensed and insured in Alabama