December is a nail-biter month for the Cultural Trust. More than 80 percent of the Trust’s  gifts arrive in the last weeks of the year, after donors have tallied up contributions to Oregon’s many cultural nonprofits and  match them with a gift to the Trust. 

And yet, we also get disappointed calls every January from donors who realize after New Years that they’d gotten too busy with holiday fun and forgot to make their match before midnight on Dec. 31. 

But there is another way… 

In addition to ensuring their cultural tax credit eligibility, donors who give before the end of the Trust’s fiscal year (June 30) will help augment available grant money for the next fiscal year. 

Grants are awarded in August, using a percentage of donations from the previous fiscal year. So, the more the Trust receives in donations by June 30, the more we can award in grants in August. 

In 2013-14, the Cultural Trust awarded more than $1.6 million in grants. Beneficiaries included sensory-sensitive children who got to see a special production at Northwest Children’s Theater and School; developmentally-challenged youth and adults, who were able to find the joys of theatre acting at PHAME Academy; 900 high school students, many from disadvantaged backgrounds, who got to hear Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor through Everybody Reads, Multnomah County; school children all around Oregon who received visits from Portland Opera To Go; middle school, high school and university students whose music education blossomed under a residency with world-renowned conductor, Grant Llewellyn and international pianist, Antonio Pompa-Baldi through Eugene Symphony; kids across Oregon who were able to take art classes by Skype, via Pendleton Council for the Arts; community members who were able to utilized the restored Art Deco Woodmen of the World Hall in Eugene and more. Every county, five of the nine federally recognized tribes, and five statewide partners all re-granted Trust grants to local organizations and educational programs across the state. 

Donations  made before June 30 will impact the amount of money that can be granted to these types of projects and many other significant cultural programs in your communities and around Oregon. 

 

Please consider making a donation to the Trust now and matching it with gifts to your favorite Oregon arts, heritage and humanities organizations later this year!