The City of Victoria is offering grants from $15,000 to $100,000 to upgrade performance and rehearsal spaces following the pandemic’s damage to the city’s arts and culture sector.
The grant program, totalling $400,000, with $150,000 specifically earmarked for accessibility upgrades, will provide eligible organizations funding for one project per year, according to the city’s press release. They include Victoria-based arts and cultural spaces operated by non-profit societies, non-profit cooperatives, registered charities, Songhees and Esquimalt First Nation Councils or Urban Indigenous non-profit organizations.
The city’s arts and culture sector contributes $435.8 million to the local economy and employs 5,588 people, on top of attracting investors and tourists, continued the release.
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“Over the last two years, arts and culture organizations have shown tremendous resilience as they pivoted and found new ways to bring programming to the community,” said Mayor Lisa Helps. “The City has lost affordable arts and culture venues during the pandemic and many that remain have pressing needs. This is why we are making the Cultural Infrastructure Grants an ongoing funding program to make venues safer and more accessible for everyone.”
Applications for the grants can be made today at the Cultural Infrastructure Grant page on the City of Victoria’s website, which also includes a registration link for early April’s information session.
The deadline for applications is April 29 at 4 p.m. An online information session will be held on April 5 at 5:30 p.m.
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