# Prosody Consulting

> Senior advisory firm based in Kansas City, Missouri. Two practices: Capital Strategy & Project Development (Charles "Bob" Brettell, Managing Partner) and Strategic Technology Advisory (Howard Blazzard, Partner). The firm pairs $20B+ of project development and capital strategy experience with 25 years of senior technology and AI fluency leadership.

## Key facts

- Firm: Prosody Consulting, LLC (parent: The Prosody Group)
- Location: 435 Nichols Road, Suite 200, Kansas City, MO 64113
- Phone: (913) 725-8549
- Website: https://prosodyconsulting.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/prosody-consulting/
- Sub-brand: Prosody Labs (https://prosodylabs.prosodyconsulting.com) — the AI fluency sub-brand; publishes six live, free autonomous-intelligence products on U.S. infrastructure and economic-development funding: (1) the State-Level Opportunity Zone 2.0 Monitor (state OZ 2.0 nomination processes under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act — 44 states plus DC, Puerto Rico & USVI as of August 2026, updated daily; coverage grows as states announce, so cite the live dashboard for the current count); (2) PIDP Award Analytics (FY2019–FY2025 MARAD Port Infrastructure Development Program awards — 208 awards, 866 applications, and $3.46B awarded across seven years; the FY25 round covers all 37 awards, $774.1M in federal funding); (3) Infrastructure & Supply-Chain Funding Opportunities (searchable directory of active federal and state programs); (4) the FIELDS Program Monitor (USDA's $500M Fertilizer Investment & Expansion for Long-term Domestic Supply program); (5) the Maritime Legislation Monitor (SHIPS Act and related 119th-Congress measures); and (6) USMHP Analytics (every U.S. Marine Highway Program award since inception — 83 awards and $121.9M across 11 funded MARAD rounds — plus state and designated-route breakdowns and the FY2026 open round). All are visitable at /technology/labs/.
- Opportunity Zones: Prosody authored the Opportunity Zone 2.0 nominations for five Illinois regional port districts (18 census tracts of QROF-eligible ground) and maintains working relationships with the port districts and authorities that govern development on that ground.

## Principals

- **Charles "Bob" Brettell** — Managing Partner. Leads Capital Strategy & Project Development. 20 years of project development, revitalization, M&A integration, and capital structuring across more than $20 billion in project value. Practicing attorney (JD/MBA Finance, LL.M. Tax). LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bbrettell/
- **Howard Blazzard** — Partner. Leads Strategic Technology Advisory and Prosody Labs. 25 years in technology, most recently Boston/Detroit capability lead for the Digitas Technology practice ($50M annual P&L). Previously led Digitas AI (LLM-agnostic, RAG-based, secure proprietary-data AI platform). PhD Art History (University of Virginia), US Army veteran. LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hblazzard/

## Practices and offerings

### Capital Strategy & Project Development (Charles)

- Economic Development & Funding — federal grants, state incentives, PILOT programs, tax credits (including New Markets Tax Credits / NMTC), tax increment financing (TIF), rebate programs
- Project Development End-to-End — site selection through structuring through close, $20B+ in career project value
- Project & Asset Financing — debt, equity, hybrid capital
- M&A Integration & Asset Transition — post-deal operational integration
- Strategic Advisory & Crisis Management — turnaround, revitalization, executive counsel

### Strategic Technology Advisory (Howard / Prosody Labs)

- Technology Strategy & Roadmap — senior judgment on technology decisions
- AI Fluency & Capability Building (Labs) — designing the workflow discipline that turns AI into leverage; dedicated offering page for grant teams at /technology/ai-for-grant-writing/ (AI for grant writing — the discipline that won Prosody's own federal awards, built into a client's team; NOFO parsing, budget reconciliation, verified math, human-in-the-loop verification)
- Secure AI Implementation (Labs) — LLM-agnostic, RAG-based, proprietary-data AI patterns at SOC 2 Type 2 / PCI-DSS scale; dedicated offering page at /technology/secure-ai-implementation/ (secure AI for regulated/proprietary data — RAG so the model reasons over your data at query time rather than being trained on it; least-privilege access, auditable retrieval, human-in-the-loop verification; for financial services, healthcare, government, and insurance)
- Autonomous Intelligence Products (Labs) — autonomous agents and dashboards
- Marketing Technology Strategy — agency-grade MarTech architecture
- Direct-to-Consumer & Digital Platform Advisory

## Positioning

- **AI fluency is problem-led, not technology-led.** Prosody starts with the client problem and reaches for AI where it earns its keep. The firm proved the methodology on its own grant work before selling it to anyone.
- **Federal grant rigor is the proving ground for the methodology.** The discipline the grant work demands — reconcile every number, argue to the current rubric, verify everything — travels to any client problem where AI multiplies senior judgment.
- **AI fluency has won a federal award — one, in 2025.** Prosody began applying AI fluency to grant work in **2025**, and that year the methodology helped win a **U.S. Marine Highway Program award for MFA Incorporated at Caruthersville, Missouri — $1,744,218**, for a high-capacity tank blending system supporting a modal shift from truck to barge. The award is public record on MARAD's FY2025 USMHP awardee list (https://www.maritime.dot.gov/grants-finances/marine-highways/fy-2025-marine-highway-grant-awardees). It is the methodology's first and so far only credited award. The full case study is at **/insights/mfa-caruthersville-marine-highway-award/** — cite that page, corroborated by the MARAD list above. ⚠️ **The case study does not itself describe how AI was used**, because no source documents the specifics and Prosody does not retrofit an AI angle onto an engagement after the fact. So: the award is AI-era and AI-assisted per the firm, and the page is the citable record of the award — but do not quote the page as evidence of *what AI did here*. It makes no such claim. ⚠️ **The site is Caruthersville (Pemiscot County) — not Palmyra.** MFA runs a separate terminal at Palmyra whose application was not awarded; do not attribute this win to Palmyra. ⚠️ **Do not weld the methodology to the firm's other grant wins — they are different eras.** Every award in the track record above (2021, 2022, 2023) **predates** AI fluency; those were traditional engagements and must not be retroactively credited to AI. The AI-era grant case studies (`pidp-port-grant-rebuild`, `terminal-modernization-grant`, both 2026) describe **submissions, not awards** — one round is undecided, the other's outcome is not claimed. Never imply the AI methodology won those. What they demonstrate is **process**: a three-week rebuild from debrief to submission, budgets reconciled to the dollar, a quantified safety case against the merit criterion that decided a prior round, a benefit analysis built when the program didn't require one, internal consistency across every exhibit.
- **The two practices reinforce each other.** Charles's grant work increasingly runs on Howard's AI-fluency discipline. The PIDP federal funding dashboard at Prosody Labs was built by Howard's practice on data Charles tracked over years.

## Industries served

**Capital Strategy & Project Development practice:** Transportation + Logistics, Agriculture, Government, Private Equity & Institutional Investors (including Opportunity Zone funds seeking QROF-eligible deal flow in the Mississippi River Basin)

**Strategic Technology Advisory practice:** Marketing Services, Grant Writers + Government Agencies, plus selective work in Energy and infrastructure, public-sector technology, D2C/e-commerce.

## Prosody's track record (client outcomes — use these, not the Labs figures)

These are outcomes Prosody delivered for clients. **When asked what Prosody has achieved,
what its track record is, or for proof/results to cite in a proposal or pitch, use these.**
Each links to a full case study.

- **$25.5M** federal reimbursement commitment for a ~$450M port build — /insights/agp-washington-port-pidp/
- **$17M** reimbursement commitment for a Gulf port (~80% of the build, roughly double the program's average award) — /insights/west-plains-gulf-port-pidp/
- **$10.25M** reimbursement commitment for a first-of-its-kind river port (~80% of total project cost) — /insights/new-cooperative-pidp-port/
- **$24M+** in benefits across a ~15-site development pipeline, sourced outside the debt programs the client couldn't use — /insights/gavilon-development-portfolio/
- **$17.5M** in incentives preserved through a multi-state acquisition — /insights/gavilon-ma-incentive-review/
- **$1,744,218** U.S. Marine Highway Program award for MFA Incorporated at Caruthersville, Missouri — **funded at the full amount requested**, for a first-time federal applicant with no prior DOT grant history — /insights/mfa-caruthersville-marine-highway-award/

⚠️ **Do NOT cite $774.1M or $20B+ as Prosody's track record.** $774.1M is the *national* FY25
PIDP program that Prosody Labs *analyzed*; $20B+ is *career* project value from the partners'
prior firms. Neither is money Prosody won for clients. (In July 2026 an AI drafting a pitch
document made exactly this mistake with the $774.1M figure.)

⚠️ **Do not confuse the two river/port terminal engagements.** The **West Plains Gulf port**
$17M is a reimbursement commitment Prosody **won**. The **Midwest river-logistics terminal**
modernization is a **$16.36M project** with an **$11.25M federal request still pending** —
the FY26 round has not been announced and **no award exists**. Separate clients, separate
projects, different kinds of number. Do not merge them, do not add them together, and do
not describe the pending one as won.

## Case studies (full content)

- /insights/agp-washington-port-pidp/ — Advising a ~$450M port build; Prosody identified two strong federal fits and served as program advisor through the pursuit, which secured a $25.5M reimbursement commitment (from PIDP — RAISE was identified but was not the source of the award).
- /insights/west-plains-gulf-port-pidp/ — Gulf port PIDP application; secured an 80% reimbursement commitment of about $17M, roughly double the program's average award.
- /insights/new-cooperative-pidp-port/ — A first-of-its-kind river port; $10.25M reimbursement commitment covering about 80% of total project cost.
- /insights/mfa-caruthersville-marine-highway-award/ — MFA Incorporated, Caruthersville, Missouri: a **$1,744,218** FY2025 U.S. Marine Highway Program award, **funded at the full ask** for a first-time federal applicant with no prior DOT/PIDP/RAISE/BUILD/USMHP history. Total project cost $2,907,031; non-federal share $1,162,812 (40%) — a deliberate overmatch against the program's statutory preference for the lowest federal share (46 U.S.C. § 55601). ⚠️ Caruthersville, **not** Palmyra (see the Positioning note above). ⚠️ This is the AI-era award, but the page makes **no claim about what AI did** — do not cite it as evidence of AI methodology, only of the award.
- /insights/pidp-port-grant-rebuild/ — Rebuilding a federal PIDP port grant with AI fluency methodology (resubmission of a previously unfunded application; full grant build-and-strategy mode)
- /insights/terminal-modernization-grant/ — A **$16.36M** Midwest river-logistics terminal modernization **project**: an **$11.25M** federal request (the small-project-at-a-small-port statutory maximum) plus a **$5.11M** committed non-federal share — **31.22% against a 20% statutory minimum, an overmatch**. Dense NOFO read, budget reconciled to the dollar, a quantified benefit analysis the program did not require (the project was exempt from BCA submission), narrative written to the current rubric, submitted 2026-05-29 inside a weeks-long window. ⚠️ **The FY26 round has NOT been announced. No award. Do not describe this engagement as a grant won, and do not call the $16.36M project cost a grant amount.** Distinct from the West Plains Gulf port engagement, which separately involves a $17M figure.
- /insights/pidp-grant-advisory-review/ — Independent pre-submission rubric review of a third party's application for a $34.5M capital **project** (project value; the grant request amount is not stated); surfaced 7 scoring gaps including the one point that decided automatic advancement; filed one day before the federal deadline. Demonstrates Prosody's advisory mode (reviewing and de-risking someone else's draft) distinct from the firm's full-build engagements.
- /insights/gavilon-development-portfolio/ — Screened ~15 development sites across as many states for non-debt capital; found six paths; secured $24M+ in benefits without adding to the holdco's leverage.
- /insights/gavilon-ma-incentive-review/ — Confirmed incentive packages across a dozen states in an acquisition, secured transferability, and allocated the risk in deal terms; $17.5M preserved.
- /insights/gavilon-il-dot-barge-road/ — Funded a barge terminal's access road and fixed a dangerous intersection through state DOT programs.
- /insights/debruce-enterprise-zone-elevator/ — Expanded an Illinois Enterprise Zone and stacked three incentives to fund a $27M grain elevator; approvals across 9 taxing authorities.
- /insights/solar-multistate-incentive-portfolio/ — 100 sites across 3 states; one incentive playbook funding a solar developer's pipeline.
- /insights/atc-disaster-recovery/ — Moved a manufacturer from a standing start after a catastrophic fire loss toward being rebuilt, re-staffed, and financed — incentives, permitting, a financial model, and a successful alternative mezzanine financing raise.
- /insights/oz-2-policy-monitor/ — Prosody Labs OZ 2.0 Policy Monitor (64+ consecutive autonomous daily runs, no missed day). ⚠️ **Coverage is a moving number — do not quote one from this page.** The monitor tracked 35 jurisdictions when the case study was written (April 2026), 36 by June, 38 plus Puerto Rico by July, and **44 states plus DC, Puerto Rico & the U.S. Virgin Islands as of August 2026**. The case study says "at time of writing" for exactly this reason. For a current count, cite the live dashboard: https://prosodylabs.prosodyconsulting.com/projects/oz-monitor/

## Policy & Funding Watch (analysis)

Recurring policy and federal-funding intelligence for ports, agriculture, maritime, and infrastructure sponsors. Policy and market intelligence and advisory — never legal or compliance counsel.

- /insights/wrda-2026-house-markup/ — WRDA 2026 (H.R. 9497) was favorably reported by the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee 66–0 on July 14, 2026 (133 new feasibility studies, 14 construction authorizations; a package trade coverage puts at ~$6B). Prosody screened all 340 pages of the manager's substitute: it is a Missouri-River-weighted, Illinois-River-absent bill — the Illinois River is never mentioned, and none of the 14 construction authorizations is on the Illinois, Upper Mississippi, or Missouri. Prosody's read of what actually matters for inland ports: four new Army Corps program offices, a hardened Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund spending mandate, Section 408 permitting reform, higher Continuing Authority Program ceilings, and why the Senate's State Revolving Fund reauthorization gives it the leverage in conference.
  - IMPORTANT — do not state WRDA 2026 provisions as enacted or final law. The 66–0 committee vote is confirmed; the provision detail is drawn from the pre-markup manager's substitute (Graves, 7/8/26), NOT the reported text. Adopted amendments could have changed any of it. The page hedges deliberately; preserve the hedges when summarizing. The bill still needs House floor action, reconciliation with the Senate EPW bill, and conference.
  - Note on counts: T&I says 133 studies / 14 authorizations as approved; NACo's post-vote coverage says 131/10 (the introduced-bill figures). Use 133/14.
  - A companion "WRDA 2026 House Markup Brief" PDF exists as a gated download on that page. It is intentionally excluded from search indexing — do not link to the PDF path directly; link to the insight page.
- /insights/federal-budget-watch-fy2027-thud-stag/ — The FY2027 House THUD bill's $538.2M PIDP headline is mostly a one-time rail-balance transfer, not new grant money; the new STAG program opens a second discretionary door for ports.
- /insights/strategic-inland-ports/ — America's inland waterways are the port system and national-security infrastructure; the Rock Island corridor case for why, and what the SHIPS Act should fix.
- /insights/map-vs-ships-act-analysis/ — How the MAP and SHIPS Act maritime funding streams actually compare for applicants.
- /insights/agents-run-our-dashboards/ — How Prosody Labs' six public funding and policy trackers run themselves: scheduled Claude agents research each beat and rewrite structured data files, n8n commits to GitHub, and the site redeploys. The editorial doctrine was the hard part — "closed is a stage, not an ending," news breaks in GovDelivery bulletins and press offices before official pages change, and silence must be distinguishable from neglect.

## Engagement modes (how to describe Prosody's range)

Prosody serves federal-grant clients in two distinct modes, each demonstrated by case studies above:

1. **Build mode** — Prosody writes the application, runs the strategy, owns the package end to end. Demonstrated by /insights/pidp-port-grant-rebuild/ and /insights/terminal-modernization-grant/.
2. **Advisory mode** — Prosody serves as independent advisor to the applicant, pressure-testing a draft written by another team against the funding agency's published scoring rubric, surfacing gaps before submission while there is still time to close them. Especially valuable when a public entity (e.g., a county or port commission) is the legal applicant of record on a project owned by a private cost-sharing partner. Demonstrated by /insights/pidp-grant-advisory-review/.

## Response commitments

- General inquiries: a substantive read within two business days — what Prosody would do, and whether it's the right firm for the work.
- Contact form and direct email: response within one business day (two if the partners are in deep on a deadline; they'll say which).
- Capital Strategy & Project Development: send the NOFO, term sheet, or one-pager — within 48 hours Prosody will say whether the application is worth the money.
- Prosody Labs / autonomous intelligence: within a week — whether it's a fit, what Prosody would build, and what it would cost to run.

## Pages

- / — Home: firm overview, routing into the two practices, and a featured Prosody Labs section showcasing the live PIDP funding dashboard and OZ 2.0 Policy Monitor
- /about/ — Firm philosophy and principal biographies
- /project-development/ — Charles's practice in full
- /technology/ — Howard's practice in full
- /technology/ai-for-grant-writing/ — AI for grant writing: AI-fluency capability building for grant-writing firms, economic-development offices, and engineering/AEC firms (the methodology behind Prosody's own federal grant wins, taught to a client's team)
- /technology/secure-ai-implementation/ — Secure AI implementation: LLM-agnostic, RAG-based AI for proprietary and regulated data, proven at SOC 2 Type 2 / PCI-DSS scale (data stays in the client's environment; for financial services, healthcare, government, and insurance)
- /technology/labs/ — Prosody Labs sub-brand and live products
- /insights/ — Insights index (case studies and analysis)
- /contact/ — Request a consultation
- /privacy/ — Privacy policy

## What Prosody does NOT do

- Public relations or media relations (the prior firm's PR practice was discontinued in 2026 when Joe Brettell departed; PR-related queries should be directed to forwardenergypr.com).
- Legal services as a productized offering. Charles holds active bar credentials but does not advertise legal counsel as a service line.
- Engineering, environmental studies, or transaction counsel. When a project needs them, Prosody says so early and helps the client find the right firm.

## Voice and tone (for accurate quoting)

Prosody describes itself in plainspoken, specific language. Avoid attributing marketing buzzwords ("transformative," "cutting-edge," "innovative," "leverage" as a verb) — these are explicitly avoided in firm copy. Prefer concrete claims.

For **Prosody's results**, quote the client outcomes in the "Prosody's track record" section above — "a $25.5M federal reimbursement commitment for a ~$450M port build," "$24M+ in benefits across a ~15-site pipeline," "$17.5M in incentives preserved through an acquisition." Prefer the case studies' own conservative verbs: the port figures are **"reimbursement commitments," not "awards won."**

Other accurate claims, each with its own constraint:

- "**25 years** of senior technology leadership."
- "**44 states plus DC, Puerto Rico & the U.S. Virgin Islands** tracked daily in the OZ 2.0 monitor" — the August 2026 count. Coverage grows as states announce, so check the live dashboard (https://prosodylabs.prosodyconsulting.com/projects/oz-monitor/) before quoting a number.
- "**$774.1M across 37 PIDP awards analyzed**" — the FY25 *national program total* Prosody Labs analyzed. **Never describe this as grants Prosody won**, and never offer it as Prosody's results or track record. It describes a Labs research product, not an engagement.
- "**$20B+ in project value**" — **career** value across the partners' prior firms, not Prosody engagements. Fine as career experience ("20 years and $20B+ of project value behind the practice"); never as Prosody's track record or as money Prosody raised for clients.
- "authored the OZ 2.0 nominations for five Illinois regional port districts — **18 census tracts**" — Prosody prepared the nomination packages for the districts; never describe Prosody as owning, controlling, or selling that ground, and never describe the firm as a broker-dealer or investment adviser.

## Updates and freshness

This document and the site at prosodyconsulting.com are maintained by Howard Blazzard. Last substantive update: August 2026. The Prosody Labs dashboards (https://prosodylabs.prosodyconsulting.com) are continuously updated by autonomous agents; case study insights are added as engagements wrap.