The Mississippi Hills Heritage Area Alliance will host a pair of workshops next week, one in Tupelo and one in Oxford, to review the eligibility and requirements of its recently announced grants program, a $150,000 category in its budget.
The alliance area encompasses all or part of 30 counties in northern Mississippi.
The grants, first announced in September, will range from $1,000 for school field trips and up to $20,000 for large community or regional projects. The smaller grants are available to individuals and groups throughout north Mississippi, the largest grants are reserved for due-paying members of the Alliance.
The first workshop will be hosted at 1:30 p.m. in Tupelo on Dec. 15 at the Mississippi Hills Exhibit Center at 398 E. Main St. On Dec. 17, a second workshop will be hosted from 10 a.m. until noon at the Oxford Conference Center at 102 Ed Perry Blvd.
The heritage area was chartered by Congress in 2009, backed by the Mississippi congressional delegation.
MHNHA describes itself as a distinctive cultural landscape shaped at and by the “dynamic intersection of Appalachian and Delta cultures, an intersection which produced a powerful concentration of nationally significant cultural icons. Lasting contributions to our country’s musical and literary legacies were forged by Hills natives Elvis Presley, William Faulkner, Tennessee Williams, Howlin’ Wolf, Jerry Lee Lewis, John Grisham and Tammy Wynette.”
The grants program is the substance leading to initiation of multiple programs and events across the 30 counties, in some cases providing first-time public awareness of rich assets generated by the people and communities of northeastern Mississippi.
Grant winners are scheduled to be announced March 15 during the alliance’s board of directors meeting in Tupelo.
The funds, it’s important to note, don’t equate to “free” money. A federal dollar-for-dollar match comes with the grants, which means those winning the grants must raise/provide as much as they receive, in cash or in-kind.
The match requirements should stir creativity and innovation, which often lead to strongly grounded new initiatives. When people take ownership of opportunity, the results often exceed expectations.
“We really like the potential of this program and feel like it can make a real difference by providing funds to all types of cultural and heritage endeavors,” said Alliance president Neal McCoy, who also heads Tupelo’s Convention and Visitors Bureau. “We have established a $150,000 grant fund in this year’s budget and we hope to see it fully disbursed.”
This grant fund presents an opportunity to increase the visibility of important but under-exposed cultural and historic assets, enriching the region at every level.