Cultural Grants Program (Outdoor Cultural Presentations -- Festivals/Parades category)

Cultural Grants Program (Outdoor Cultural Presentations -- Festivals/Parades category) is sponsored by City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs (DCA). This program invests in free and low-cost, public cultural activities in Los Angeles. Nonprofit community-service organizations can propose to plan and present outdoor festivals or parades in partnership with a tribal elder, arts curator, or arts agency.

Grants are available for both large (more than 2,000 attendees) and small (500 to 2,000 attendees) outdoor festivals/parades.

Eligibility – Cultural Grants Program must be a nonprofit 501(c)3 organization with a primary purpose to provide arts/cultural services, or a charitable organization [e.g. 501(c)3, 501(c)6, etc.] that will partner with one or more arts partners to present an outdoor festival or parade must have an emphasis on arts/culture in its mission statement (unless collaborating with an arts partner for an outdoor festival or parade) must be headquartered in Los Angeles County must propose a project for which they have at least one year of experience producing and presenting must have a minimum of one year of prior arts programming within the City of L.

A. must have at least the last two most recently completed fiscal years of data entered in their DCA Financial & Programmatic Profile form (not applicable to Emerging Arts Organizations and non-arts-focused 501(c) festival/parade applicants). must fulfill the additional qualifications for the category in which it applies City of L.

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funding through the DCA is targeted support for: public benefit artistic projects in the arts sector service, culture/history, dance, outdoor or online festivals/parades, literature, media, music, multi-disciplinary arts, theatre, traditional/folk art, or visual/design arts projects that take place within the City of Los Angeles (note: any proposed services to be delivered online/virtually/via broadcast must be produced within the City of Los Angeles) proposals that can demonstrate a required 1:1 match for the grant requested projects may take place in schools, as long as the proposed activities are not part of any school or institution’s regular/closed curriculum and do not duplicate or replace current staff, and culminate in at least one activity that takes place after school hours in the evenings or weekends and is promoted to the general public.

Within the context of each proposal, the service expenses best aligned with DCA grant funding are: payments to local artists, technical collaborators, and project managers schools, as long as the proposed activities are not part of any school or institution’s regular/closed curriculum and do not duplicate or replace current staff, and culminate in at least one activity that is marketed and accessible to the school’s neighborhood community and take place after school hours An applicant’s proposal should provide services that include one or more of the following: consideration of the community environment or focus on relevant community issues provide communities with participatory or engaging art experiences development of new audiences including those in geographically diverse areas or culturally diverse populations programs presented in appropriate host venues, non-commercial, or non-traditional public spaces advancement of an artistic discipline with commensurate creativity or innovation distribution of documentary materials that elaborate on the concept of the project The primary applicant listed on a DCA grant proposal should not be: an organization with little history presenting arts/culture programs agencies or units of government including cities, counties, states, libraries, recreation departments general education schools /universities that do not have a primary focus on the arts The Department of Cultural Affairs does not fund: deficit or debt-reduction efforts mortgage payments, building construction or renovation special permits or insurance projects that are primarily religious in nature or intent, unless a special case is made that the proposed artistic services are multi-denominational in nature or intent hospitality (travel, accommodations, or food costs) competitions or contests, cash prizes or awards RFPs, open-calls, “Open Mics”, or similar initiatives where artists are unknown at the time of the application, or projects involving unscripted walk-on players re-granting without involvement by the Department of Cultural Affairs cash reserves or endowments purchase of depreciable assets projects that remunerate DCA commissioners, DCA full-time employees, DCA part-time employees, or any members of the Board of Directors of the applicant organization.

DCA is a project (not a full-program or general operating) funder, therefore eligible projects should be proposed as 6 months or 2 seasons maximum; so they can be closed and reported upon within 9 months maximum. Your proposal should describe a specific project (such as a portion of a program) which can take place within a six month timeframe and within the grant period.

Applicants should not apply for year-round funding private events, fundraising events (including benefit-concert type activities wherein surplus revenues are collected and donated to named or unnamed causes), Private invitation-only events, very expensive activities, open-call (no matter the theme), and contests are not eligible; because DCA needs to sponsor event that pay pre-selected artists, who generate accessible activities/events, and forecast engagement with a target audience based on one-year of prior experience.