diff --git a/cfgov/v1/jinja2/v1/layouts/base.html b/cfgov/v1/jinja2/v1/layouts/base.html
index 2d278890ef7..a7ce70c63cf 100644
--- a/cfgov/v1/jinja2/v1/layouts/base.html
+++ b/cfgov/v1/jinja2/v1/layouts/base.html
@@ -60,7 +60,8 @@
             {%- endblock -%}
           ">
     <meta name="searchgov_custom1" content="{{ language }}">
-    <meta name="searchgov_custom2" content="{{ self.desc() }}">
+    {# Base32 encoding used to avoid an issue with Search.gov custom fields losing capitalization. -#} 
+    <meta name="searchgov_custom2" content="{{ encode_b32_string(self.desc()) }}">
 
     {# Always open preview panel links in a new tab. #}
     {% if request.in_preview_panel %}
diff --git a/cfgov/v1/jinja2tags/__init__.py b/cfgov/v1/jinja2tags/__init__.py
index 424461aa60c..084cf0580b9 100644
--- a/cfgov/v1/jinja2tags/__init__.py
+++ b/cfgov/v1/jinja2tags/__init__.py
@@ -1,3 +1,5 @@
+from base64 import b32encode
+
 from jinja2 import pass_context
 from jinja2.ext import Extension
 
@@ -51,6 +53,10 @@ def unique_id_in_context(context):
         return get_unique_id()
 
 
+def encode_b32_string(s):
+    return b32encode(s.encode("utf-8")).decode("utf-8")
+
+
 class V1Extension(Extension):
     def __init__(self, environment):
         super().__init__(environment)
@@ -63,6 +69,7 @@ def __init__(self, environment):
                 "get_unique_id": get_unique_id,
                 "is_filter_selected": pass_context(is_filter_selected),
                 "unique_id_in_context": pass_context(unique_id_in_context),
+                "encode_b32_string": encode_b32_string,
                 "app_url": app_url,
                 "app_page_url": app_page_url,
             }
diff --git a/cfgov/v1/sitemap.py b/cfgov/v1/sitemap.py
index abf171fc331..5a94447b4ba 100644
--- a/cfgov/v1/sitemap.py
+++ b/cfgov/v1/sitemap.py
@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@ class Sitemap(WagtailSitemap):
     # Used to set a minimum modified date for all pages in the sitemap.
     # This can be updated to trigger sitemap updates that are not reflected
     # in Wagtail page publish events.
-    MIN_SITEMAP_DATE = datetime(2025, 6, 4, tzinfo=timezone.utc)
+    MIN_SITEMAP_DATE = datetime(2025, 7, 9, tzinfo=timezone.utc)
     latest_lastmod = MIN_SITEMAP_DATE
 
     def get_urls(self, page=1, site=None, protocol=None):
diff --git a/cfgov/v1/tests/jinja2tags/test_jinja2tags.py b/cfgov/v1/tests/jinja2tags/test_jinja2tags.py
index 340966f3494..2b5f85c5342 100644
--- a/cfgov/v1/tests/jinja2tags/test_jinja2tags.py
+++ b/cfgov/v1/tests/jinja2tags/test_jinja2tags.py
@@ -98,3 +98,16 @@ def test_nonexistent_category_name_returns_none(self):
         self.checkRender(
             "{{ get_category_icon('Invalid category name') }}", "None"
         )
+
+
+class TestEncodeB32String(SimpleTestCase):
+    def setUp(self):
+        self.jinja_engine = engines["wagtail-env"]
+
+    def test_encode_b32_string(self):
+        s = (
+            "{%- block desc -%}cfpb{%- endblock -%}"
+            "{{encode_b32_string(self.desc())}}"
+        )
+        template = self.jinja_engine.from_string(s)
+        self.assertEqual(template.render(), "cfpbMNTHAYQ=")
diff --git a/cfgov/v1/tests/test_sitemap.py b/cfgov/v1/tests/test_sitemap.py
index b6d8d174b3f..7bd2b0591fd 100644
--- a/cfgov/v1/tests/test_sitemap.py
+++ b/cfgov/v1/tests/test_sitemap.py
@@ -29,13 +29,13 @@ def test_sitemap(self):
             (
                 b'<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>\n'
                 b'<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9" xmlns:xhtml="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">\n'
-                b"<url><loc>http://localhost/</loc><lastmod>2025-06-03</lastmod></url>"
-                b"<url><loc>http://localhost/old/</loc><lastmod>2025-06-03</lastmod></url>\n"
+                b"<url><loc>http://localhost/</loc><lastmod>2025-07-08</lastmod></url>"
+                b"<url><loc>http://localhost/old/</loc><lastmod>2025-07-08</lastmod></url>\n"
                 b"</urlset>\n"
             ),
         )
 
         # The Last-Modified header should also be set appropriately.
         self.assertEqual(
-            response["Last-Modified"], "Wed, 04 Jun 2025 00:00:00 GMT"
+            response["Last-Modified"], "Wed, 09 Jul 2025 00:00:00 GMT"
         )