Jen Lawless, Senior Director of Program Operations
To support our equity goals, Mass Cultural Council has expanded the number and types of organizations we want to invest in through a redesign of our grant programs and expanded outreach efforts.
Over the past three years we have seen a steady rise in grant applications from cultural organizations across all programs. With an increased number of applicants, we have also had to decline more eligible applications than ever before – even with increases in our state appropriation. Last year (FY24), while we were proud to fund 1,656 organizations, there were roughly 500 applicant organizations that did not receive any funding from our agency.
With our redesigned grant programs mostly underway, Mass Cultural Council staff has examined where our organizational funding is going to see if we are meeting our goal of serving the sector more broadly and equitably.
We found that 118 organizations (8% of our organizational grant recipients) receiving multiple and/or the largest Mass Cultural Council awards benefited from 57% of the grant funding available to organizations in FY24.
To ensure that we can fund as many cultural organizations as possible, we are working to thoughtfully coordinate and limit overlap of our grant recipients across programs.
While we have been moving in this direction over the last couple of fiscal years, guided by our equity and strategic plans, FY25 marks the next stage in this approach. This year (FY25), cultural organizations are eligible to receive one of the following grants:
For the first time, FY25 Gaming Mitigation Fund guidelines will specify that organizations receiving operating support through the Cultural Investment Portfolio or Operating Grants for Organizations are not eligible for the Gaming Mitigation Fund.
Early Successes
Mass Cultural Council is already seeing success in our efforts to more equitably distribute funds with this shift:
- In FY25, we will be able to award operating support grants to 45 more organizations than in FY24. All due to limiting the overlap of our grant recipients across programs.
- Through our new Operating Grants for Organizations program we will be able to fund approximately 150 cultural organizations. While this is only 30% of the eligible organizations that applied – we are encouraged as 126 are first-time recipients of operating support from the Agency and 59 identify as BIPOC-Centered organizations.
Moving Forward
As we continue to redesign and finalize our programs for FY26 and beyond, we will keep on intentionally coordinating our programs. Each set of program guidelines will make clear which programs are limited to one grant. Our staff will be able to help organizations to determine which grant program would be the best fit for them, allowing organizations to only apply to those programs instead of spending hours applying to every program.
This change is just one example of how the Agency is working to invest financial, programmatic, and informational resources equitably.