Fund for Columbia County Awards 34 Grants
July 24 , 2007
Great Barrington, MA — Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation today announced that 34 nonprofit organizations in Columbia County, NY have been awarded grants from three of its Area Funds: the Fund for Columbia County, Our Town Fund and Quailwood Fund. The Our Town Fund serves the towns of Canaan, Austerlitz, Ghent and New Lebanon NY; the Quailwood Fund provides grants for the Red Rock are and the Fund for Columbia County serves the entire county.
“The grants awarded this year illustrate the variety of needs addressed by area funds,” said Jennifer Dowley, president of Berkshire Taconic. “The grants will benefit Columbia County towns by supporting children’s programs, firefighters, arts programs, libraries and other activities vital to all residents of the area.”
This year marks the last round of grants for the Our Town Fund. Starting in 2008, the Fund for Columbia County will support all of the towns of Columbia County except Red Rock, which will continue to receive grants from the Quailwood Fund.
The next deadline for grant applications for both the Fund for Columbia County and Quailwood Fund is April 1, 2008. Applications are available online at www.berkshiretaconic.org or by calling Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation at 800-969-2823.
The Our Town Fund awarded $14,900 to nine organizations:
Clarion Concerts: $1,200 for outreach support to increase public awareness of “Leaf Peeper” concerts.
Columbia Berkshire Craft Guild: $1,000 for a 2-day event that will allow community members to tour artists’ galleries from Claverack to New Lebanon.
Millay Colony for the Arts: $1,000 for a new series of public programs featuring resident artists.
Town of Ghent: $3,000 for an updated comprehensive plan that addresses issues of protecting, preserving, and enhancing the natural resources of the town.
Crellin Morris Association: $3,000 to strengthen its volunteer program, which is dedicated to the success of youth in the community.
Chatham Central School District: $3,000 for “Fall Festival Shakespeare,” an annual program that brings professional actors, directors and theater technicians into the Chatham High School to stage a play by Shakespeare.
Hawthorne Valley Association: $1,000 for the Summer Sinfonia “Ringing Strings” day camp program, which offers young student musicians training in Scottish and Shetland Island music.
Mountain Road School: $1,000 for its “Empty Bowl” program, in which school children help create ceramic bowls and feed their classmates, families and guests a bowl of soup, in exchange for which the recipients donate money to a hunger-fighting organization.
Family Resource Centers: $700 to purchase signs to be stationed outside of the centers and used at community events.
The Fund for Columbia County awarded $30,000 to 22 organizations:
Animalkind: $1,050 for strategic planning, which will allow the organization to set realistic and achievable goals for the future.
Columbia County Council on the Arts: $1,000 for Art in Landscape, which opens the studios of 14 of the county’s artists to the public, and provides transportation to them for disadvantaged youth.
Stageworks on the Hudson: $1,000 for Theatre Arts for Schoolkids (TASK) Student Ticket Subsidy Program, which will provide 160 students the unique opportunity to experience live professional theater by attending a free, special student matinee of Stageworks’ “Elliot, A Soldier’s Fugue.”
Churchtown Fire Company: $1,000 to purchase radios for fire-ground communications.
Clausson-Raught Community Rescue Squad: $1,000 for high band radios that will be used by responders who go directly to the scene of an emergency medical call.
FASNY Museum of Firefighting: $750 for “Dalmatian Day,” a free family-oriented community program celebrating dalmatians.
Greenport Historical Society: $1,500 to preserve the historic Columbia Turnpike West Gate Toll House.
Hillsdale Heritage Committee: $1,500 for a survey for as many as 100 of the historic properties in the hamlet of Hillsdale.
Hudson Athens Lighthouse Preservation: $1,500 to purchase technology equipment for preserving and presenting the history of the lighthouse and its keepers.
Hudson Opera House: $2,425 for community arts programs, which make cultural and educational performances, workshops, and events accessible to a diverse community.
Investments in Youth: $1,000 for students in financial need to participate in a week-long summer camp at Bard College.
Operation Unite: $1,500 for free workshops for youth during the summer and fall of 2007, culminating in a participant performance and guest theater group performance.
Time & Space Limited: $2,000 for TSL Outside, which produces free events at the waterfront in Hudson every Saturday night during July.
Claverack Library: $1,000 for a summer literacy program for children ages 3-12.
Concerted Effort: $2,000 for the Hudson school project, which engages primary school children in learning through the performing arts.
Hudson Area Association Library: $1,500 to double the number of computer training classes currently offered for seniors.
Hudson Day Care: $1,000 for supplies and materials for scholarship funding. Literacy Connections: $1,500 to expand its computer lab.
Literacy Inc: $1,500 for “Engaging Hudson Parents in Early Literacy,” a program committed to deepening collaborative early literacy efforts.
Common Ground Dispute Resolution: $1,000 to produce an interactive mediation training and educational video on the internet.
NYSARC-Columbia: $2,275 for a program allowing people with developmental disabilities the opportunity to develop their musical, dance, and dramatic abilities.
The Quailwood Fund awarded $25,000 to four organizations:
Red Rock Volunteer Fire Company: $6,000 for a campaign for a new firehouse.
Red Rock Historical Society: $6,000 for building restorations.
Canaan Conservation Club: $$3,500 for energy-efficient windows and an energy-efficient front door.
Columbia Land Conservancy: $9,500 for a public swimming beach at Jon’s Pond in the center of Red Rock.
Each of the three funds has a committee of local residents which reviews grant applications and awards grants based on excellence of the project or service, its impact on the organization or community and the ability of the organization to carry out the project.
Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation is a nonprofit organization that cultivates philanthropy in ways that have a direct positive impact on the cities and towns of Columbia County and northeast Dutchess County, NY; northwest Litchfield County, CT; and Berkshire County, MA. For more information please contact Berkshire Taconic at 271 Main Street, Suite 3, Great Barrington, MA, 01230, call 800-969-2823, e-mail info@berkshiretaconic.org or visit www.berkshiretaconic.org.
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