Announcing $180,979 in funding for 65 projects in Cleveland and East Cleveland

The Neighbor Up Action Grant Committee approved $180,979 in grants to support 65 projects in Cleveland and East Cleveland neighborhoods. Cuyahoga Arts & Culture, the local public funder for arts and culture, will co-fund eight of the resident-led arts and culture projects through a partnership with Neighborhood Connections. Cleveland Climate Action Fund will fund five of the projects through a partnership with Neighborhood Connections.

Highlights of the grants include:

  • Click Collective’s* East Cleveland: A Photographic Journey of Resilience and Rebirth is organizing a photography project throughout the neighborhood that shows the positive images of East Cleveland.
  • Teen Start’s Minorites in Construction Program will connect unemployed or underemployed young African-American men, ages 18 to 34 years old, who are interested in construction, with workshops and hands-on training in basic construction and maintenance.
  • The Muslim Writers Collective* will create a poetry collective for Muslim-identifying and Muslim heritage artists, which is womyn and queer-led and based in Sufi practices of worship and divine communion and creative practice.
  • Gordon Square CPR is a group of neighborhood paramedics who will train 100 persons in CPR, AED, Naloxone treatment, and Stop the Bleed. They will also place four more public access AED stations throughout the community and provide free training to individuals in the neighborhood.

*Co-funded by Cuyahoga Arts & Culture

“Together, people have the power to make real change and they’re doing it,” said Tom O’Brien, program director of Neighborhood Connections. “Residents from Cleveland and East Cleveland have innovative ideas and a small amount of funding can make those ideas a reality.”

Since 2003, Neighbor Up Action Grants have invested more than $8.1 million in more than 2,500 resident-led projects. 

Cuyahoga Arts & Culture invested $75,000 in Neighborhood Connections in 2019 to support additional community-based arts and culture activities organized by and for Cuyahoga County residents.  Through this partnership with Neighborhood Connections, CAC has co-funded 340 resident-led arts and culture projects in Cleveland and East Cleveland since 2013.

“Arts and culture have the potential to transform a neighborhood,” said Jill M. Paulsen, CAC’s interim CEO and executive director. “Through our partnership with Neighborhood Connections, we’ve shifted power to hundreds of groups of residents who are using their creativity to energize and change our community for the better.”

See a complete list of grants awarded here.

The grants, called Neighbor Up Action Grants, are offered to groups of residents in Cleveland and East Cleveland to do projects that improve the quality of life in their neighborhoods. Groups are encouraged to work with partners and to propose creative solutions to challenges in their community. The next deadline to apply for a grant is Friday, February 14, 2020. Find out more information here.