From the Grassroots: A Big Announcement from the NEA

Today we’re celebrating a success that has taken a lot of time, work and intention.

The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA)has just announced that they’re opening their COVID-19 relief support opportunity to ALL arts and cultural organizations, regardless of whether they’ve received previous support from the NEA.

WHY IS THIS EXCITING & IMPORTANT?

We’ll explain, using our organization as an example!

Although we are a nonprofit organization, a majority of our money is earned. Most years we average 60–70% earned income, with very few grants. In normal circumstances, having robust earned income is a true gift and asset. It means that we are flexible, self-determined and are able to focus on the initiatives and ideas that are most important to our organization without having to adapt to the shifting priorities of foundations.

Many grassroots organizations of our size operate similarly — we’re scrappy, community-based and we know how to make small dollars go a long way. That’s powerful and beautiful to us, so much so that remaining grassroots has become an organizational value. When COVID-19 hit, organizations like ours were forced to suspend their operations, resulting in major financial losses due to the cancellation of all of our events, field trips, rentals and classes.

We applied for our first-ever NEA grant just before the COVID-19 pandemic. Because of our small size, we lacked the staff capacity to apply for a federal grant from the National Endowment for the Arts in previous years. All told, the process took over 60 dedicated staff hours between two staff people. That’s a huge investment for us. So, when the federal government announced NEA COVID-19 relief funds for arts and cultural non-profits, we were thrilled. This funding would help us to retain staff, pay rent (after deferring for months) and support our responsive community work.

And then — WOMP, WOMP, WOMP! We discovered that we were not eligible for funding. Only organizations that received NEA grants within the last four years were eligible to apply. This provision excluded over 1,800 grassroots or small arts and cultural organizations across the nation — many of which were rural, working class, BIPOC-led or otherwise outside of the dominant nonprofit paradigm. It excluded us and many of our peer organizations doing vital and inspiring work.

WE WERE FRUSTRATED AND REALIZED THAT WE NEEDED TO ORGANIZE ON BEHALF OF GRASSROOTS ORGANIZATIONS LIKE OURS.

Moving quickly, we reached out to over 150 small arts and cultural organizations across the south to ask how they were doing. A majority were in the same position as us — they were in dire need of immediate support yet not eligible for federal relief from the National Endowment for the Arts.

We wrote a letter making the case for direct funding to the grassroots (instead of trickle-down-funding given to larger anchor organizations) and circulated it widely. And then in May, alongside a group of arts leaders from Richmond and across the South, we facilitated meetings with the National Endowment for the Arts, Americans for the Arts, AlternateROOTS, SouthArts, and Virginia Senator Mark Warner to advocate for equitable funding to the grassroots sector.

Senator Warner, for example, was surprised to learn that NEA relief was only available to organizations who had previously been funded. Americans for the Arts were aware that this funding model would be detrimental to small organizations and were already hard at work planning an advocacy campaign. The NEA graciously listened to our case and appeal.

Many such efforts arose during this time to advocate for equitable distribution of funding but few prioritized giving funds directly to the grassroots. We’ve got a long way to go to build a system that trusts community-based organizations to receive and steward funding without the assistance of large institutions managing from on high, but the NEA’s decision is a HUGE and powerful step.

In addition to direct funding for grassroots, we are also calling upon anchor institutions to credit and uplift the work of the organizations who have had their boots on the ground, organizing for these changes. Name the work of your grassroots and community organization partners in interviews and in foundation and fundraising meetings. Rather than accepting large dollars to distribute downwards, build alliances and pass the funding relationship along directly.

WHAT’S NEXT?

Let’s get this funding into the hands of grassroots organizations!

We’re hosting a free clinic to support any grassroots organization in the process of applying for federal NEA relief support. The deadline to apply is August 25th at 11:59pm!

CLICK HERE for clinic details and to sign up!

Are you eligible for NEA relief funding?

Please read these guidelines before signing up for our clinic:

• You must be a non-profit, tax-exempt 501(c)(3), U.S. organization; unit of state or local government; or federally recognized tribal community or tribe. Applicants may be arts organizations, local arts agencies, arts service organizations, local education agencies (school districts), and other organizations that can help advance the goals of the Arts Endowment.

• Have three years of programming history (you have to be able to demonstrate that your organization has hosted 3 full years of programming).

• Have a current SAMS account (we can help you get one!) and a DUNS number (We can explain this too!)