Northwest Iowa — The Iowa Department of Cultural Affairs is awarding grants to 267 organizations, including 7 from northwest Iowa, from federal pandemic funds set aside to help them out. Department director Chris Kramer says a wide range of groups are getting grants.
(As above) “Arts and cultural organizations, performing arts venues, lie music venues, museums — you know these are community anchor organizations that really help support community tourism and support our communities overall,” Kramer says.
She says these organizations have been shut down for several months by the COVID-19 restrictions — and that has hurt them and their towns.
(As above) “We had more than 550 requests for funding that totaled more than 35 million dollars in expenses. So, we know that our arts and cultural sector really needed some relief,” Kramer says.
The one-time grants range from 15-hundred dollars to 175-thousand dollars.
(As above) “We tried to evaluate the losses that various organizations had in alignment with the strict rules and regulations of the CARES Act,” according to Kramer. “And so there are certain expenses that were allowed — mostly to support salaries and other operating expenses really due to the losses they had suffered throughout 2020.”
Kramer says it gives them some help.
(As above) “By all means, this isn’t going to cover all of their losses — but these grants can provide a bridge to the future stimulus that was just passed through Congress — and really help the organizations make it through a very dire financial period,” Kramer says.
The grant recipients here in our area include: Northwest Iowa Symphonic Orchestra of Sioux Center, which received $9,300; Pearson Lakes Art Center at Okoboji, which received $60,300; Historic Arnolds Park Museums, which got $41,300; Iowa Rock & Roll Music Hall of Fame at Arnolds Park, which was awarded $16,000; Arts on Grand in Spencer, which received $5,300; Clay County Heritage Center in Spencer, which was awarded $5,000; and the Spencer Community Theatre, which received a $10,000 grant.
