Twenty-three organizations were recently selected through a competitive regional call to receive $140,000 grants as part of the Central Coast Creative Corps, a pilot grant program funded by the California Arts Council.
Grantees were selected from a pool of more than 100 applicants by a panel of Central Coast-based artists and community leaders. Organizations in Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Ventura, Monterey, Santa Cruz, and San Benito counties were eligible to apply.
R.A.C.E. Matters SLO County, Lumina Alliance in SLO, the Blue Sky Center in New Cuyama, and Santa Barbara County-based nonprofit Family Services Agency were among the 23 recipients chosen, according to the San Luis Obispo County Arts Council. Each grantee will use the funds awarded to work with a local artist or artists collective on a project for the duration of one year.
“We are thrilled to support R.A.C.E. Matters and Lumina Alliance as our county’s partnering organizations with the Central Coast Creative Corps,” Jordan Chesnut, SLO County Arts Council programs director, said in a statement. “Artists are changemakers in their communities and the resulting collaborations will surely demonstrate that.”
Of each grant, $100,000 will go directly to the artist or collective, $20,000 will be allocated for supplies, materials, and other project costs, and the remaining $20,000 will go to the grantee for administration fees.
Hannah Rubalcava, grants and contracts manager for the Santa Barbara County Office of Arts and Culture described the 23 grantees chosen as representing “a diverse group of organizations—from their geographic locations, organization/budget size, and missions” and “a broad spectrum of the incredible work done by nonprofit and government agencies across the six-county region.”
“We look forward to working with them over the next year and seeing what is possible when artists work with these organizations and the impact it has on our communities,” Rubalcava said in the statement.
For more info on the Central Coast Creative Corps, visit centralcoastcreativecorps.org.
This article appears in Jun 29 – Jul 9, 2023.