Marion Cultural Development Corporation Awards OCT Monies

(Salem, Oregon) - Marion Cultural Development Corporation announced this week the awarding of $29,600 of Oregon Cultural Trust monies to 17 Marion County non-profit organizations. Organizations receiving funds must match the grant with their own funds. Grants must meet the objectives of promoting awareness of Marion County’s cultural assets, strengthening communities by upholding diverse cultural traditions as well as vital urban centers and the distinctive historic character of small towns and neighborhoods, inspiring youth to engage in creative expression and heritage activities and supporting their efforts to develop cultural awareness, developing leadership for maintaining vigorous cultural organizations, supporting excellence, and encouraging investment in the arts, heritage, and humanities as a means of stimulating cultural and economic vitality. Projects must be completed during the coming year.

Grant recipients in the Salem area include Art Smart, $1,000 for ‘Arts, Culture and Heritage for All’ allowing access to area cultural events for low income residents; Children’s Theatre Foundation, $1,600 to support performing arts enrichment workshops for middle and high school students; Oregon State Hospital Museum of Mental Health, $2,000 for schematic drawings for their museum of artifacts and stories about those who lived and worked in the hospital; Salem Chamber Orchestra, $2,000 to support a traveling chamber music program for school-age children in communities facing severe reductions in music education programs; Salem Film Society, $2,000 to support the Salem Film Festival with screenings of diverse films, panels and workshops along with youth and amateur competitions; Salem Folklore Community, $2,000 to equip KMUZ radio to broadcast live from local arts and cultural events; Salem-Keizer Community Development Corporation, $1,500 to strengthen communities through four free family-friendly neighborhood summer concerts; Family YMCA of Marion and Polk Counties, $2,000 for their Salem Peace Mosaic, a community art project culminating in the installation of an exterior mosaic at the Salem YMCA.

In Silverton, the Gordon House Conservancy received $1,000 for their school outreach pilot program with Silver Falls School District educators to integrate field study of architecture with classroom study; Silverton Arts Association, $2,000 to acquire the ArtSense Curriculum for use by area elementary teachers; Silverton Poetry Association, $500 for a free public performance combining music and poetry as part of the 2012 Silverton Poetry Festival.

Elsewhere in the county, Cascade School District received a grant for $2,000 for an Artist-in-Residence program and heritage craft activities for Turner’s first heritage celebration; and Friends of the Jefferson Library, $2,000 for their summer reading program, ‘One World, Many Stories,’ with weekly cultural and craft activities. St. Paul Mission Historical Society received $2,000 for the creation of an audio-visual history of the Tejano-Mexican migrants of the 1940s who settled in the St. Paul area and the Woodburn Art Center received $2,000 to expand the summer KidsArt program of weekly classes to include drawing and cooking.

The Oregon Cultural Trust is an innovative plan to increase private and public investment in the arts, heritage and humanities. The Trust receives money through the sale of Cultural Trust license plates, charitable donations, and an innovative, and increasingly popular, tax credit donation match for charitable organizations. Oregon Cultural Trust Manager Kimberly Howard observed, "We applaud the work of the Marion Cultural Development Corporation. With funds received from the Trust each year, MCDC's hard-working volunteer board supports cultural projects that are vital to communities across the county. Coalition grants reach down to the grassroots where cultural funding makes a difference every day to libraries, historical societies and art programs for children. Those grants are made possible entirely by people who donate to the Cultural Trust and receive a 100% Oregon tax credit. More donations equal more grants. I encourage everyone in Marion County to support MCDC's excellent work in the community by donating to the Cultural Trust."