Implementation and Innovation Fund
Summer 2020 Cycle
The Government Alliance on Race and Equity (GARE) is pleased to announce our latest cycle of funding for our Innovation and Implementation Fund as an exclusive member benefit and acknowledgement for creativity in the field. The Summer 2020 Round provides the opportunity to focus in two ways:
- Strategically — Support public sector partnerships with artists and cultural workers to shape racially equitable public policy and develop and implement inclusive narratives that advance racial justice.
- Geographically — in the State of California (a focus, but not limited to CA).
GARE appreciates the support of the California Endowment, the San Francisco Foundation, and the Surdna Foundation for funding that provides flexible resources for local government to seed projects that are focused on eliminating structural racism. Projects selected for funding will work across institutions and further partnerships with communities.
Funding
A total of $110k will be awarded through this process, with at least $56k awarded in California and $54k for projects with a strong arts and culture or narrative focus. Requests will be considered up to $20,000.
The Government Alliance on Race and Equity invites our members to apply. The deadline for submission is 11:59 PM EST on Sunday, July 12th for a Monday, July 27th, 2020 notification. A link to the application will be posted to the GARE Portal by COB, Wednesday, June 17th.
Priorities for the Fund:
The Fund will prioritize supporting projects that:
- Confront structural racism using arts and culture strategies that can shift narratives in a more inclusive direction.
- Advance a true and just reflection of the narratives of race within the cultural landscape rooted in the truth and acknowledgement of our collective histories.
- Incorporate a structural analysis of racism in development and implementation of the proposed activities
- Build on, align, and further work that has and is being done to advance racial equity / eliminate racial inequities in community outcomes, and eliminate structural racism.
- Model accountable practices and relationships between participants, leadership, and partners involved
- Center the experiences and leadership of communities most impacted by structural racial inequities, including artists of color and arts organizations led by and serving communities of color (we recognize the importance of resourcing, grantmaking, funding or project-support directed specifically to small or midsize arts organizations for and by communities of color, led by staff of color (including staff at leadership levels). Small or midsize arts organizations here refer to budget size (with annual budgets of less than $500,000) and staff size (of less than 10 staff members).
- Leverage opportunities that are likely to have the greatest impact, including through having arts and culture incorporated into existing activities, such as community engagement and budgeting
- Produce processes and tools that can be shared and are sustainable
Selected projects will participate in a community of practitioners committed to racially and culturally-equitable and anti-oppressive practices within the group and in government work; these include practices that foster belonging, accountability, awareness of power, transparency and resilient relationships. Representatives from projects will be invited to participate in a convening, anticipated to be in early 2021, and will share their projects via blogs and an issue paper.
Examples of Potential Projects:
- Regranting and allocating funds for local, community-supported projects that engage and employ artists and cultural workers of color, or that support local arts organizations of color. Resourcing arts and cultural projects that amplify historically marginalized cultural traditions, storytelling and practices from communities of color.
- Efforts to adapt and implement equity-focused mandates of local Cultural Plans or Cultural Planning processes to directly address racism and racial disparities. For cities or jurisdictions without completed Cultural Plans, using these funds for supporting internal organizing and advocacy around the creation of race-explicit Cultural Plans.
- Efforts to change internal operations, policies, and procedures resulting in more racially-equitable outcomes as well as more explicit racial equity goals for programs, funding and services.
- Efforts that establish and build capacity of partnerships between arts agencies within the GARE network to organize and advocate for cultural and racial equity and justice.
- Efforts that bring in artists of color and cultural strategists as advisers, mentors, coaches, facilitators, healers, organizers, etc. into the work of government.
- Contracting and/or hiring of artists of color or arts organizations or collectives of color, specifically for advancing agency-supported community projects that lift up principles of racial and cultural justice.
- Cross-agency efforts to develop and implement arts and culture projects that engage local communities in other areas (e.g. health, housing, public safety, transportation, etc.).
Proposals:
Proposals should include responses to the following (maximum scores per response as indicated in parentheses):
- A description of the project that details a prominent and explicit focus on cultural equity and justice, including the anticipated outcomes, results, and an explanation of which priorities the project meets (30 points)
- A description of how the project is anticipated to use cultural and narrative strategies to advance racial equity (20 points)
- Description of how the project resources and centers the needs of communities of color, artists of color and organizations led by and serving people of color. (25 points)
- A list of partners, including contact information for the project lead and all partners and a description of their roles (10 points)
- A total budget for the project, including identification of items to be funded by the Implementation and Innovation resource (5 points)
- Multiple jurisdictions, agencies or issue areas represented in the application (10 points)
If there is background information you would like reviewers to have access to, please use the upload feature of the Submittable form. Reviewers will read this additional background information as time allows, so make sure all critical information in support of your application is included in the 3 pages of your proposal. Multi-jurisdictional co-applicants only need to submit one application for consideration.
Questions should be directed to GARE Gulf/Delta Regional Manager Juan Serrano at innovation@raceforward.org with subject line: Arts and Culture Innovation.