The Purchase of Service Grant aims to broaden public access to arts activities and encourage organizations to be more creative in planning cultural arts projects. The City sets aside a certain budgeted amount each year to provide grants to cultural arts organizations and programs for purposes of promoting the cultural arts throughout the City.
Based on the amount budgeted for City Grants and other amounts received from the Illinois Arts Council, if any, the Cultural Arts Commission makes an overall recommendation to the City Council for the allocation of the City Grants to individual cultural arts organizations and programs.
The 2018 - 2019 Purchase of Service Grant Application is due August 15. No late applications will be accepted.
Requirements:
- Applicants must be a Not-for-profit Corporation 501(c)(3) supporting residents of Highland Park.
- The program must aim to broaden public access to arts activities.
- The grant recipient shall only make expenditures of the Grant during the program period, which is September 1 – July 31.
- The funds shall be expended only on the Funded Program outlined in the application.
- The grant cannot be used on the purchase of any permanent equipment, capital improvements or construction, payment of the previous year's deficit, or any activities outside the State of Illinois.
- The grant recipient must credit the City of Highland Park Cultural Arts Commission and Illinois Arts Council on all public notices, publicity, printed programs, public media, and other applicable material.
- The grant recipient must fill out a final evaluation report no later than July 31.
Evaluation Criteria
Does the project:
- Encourage new works or innovative projects?
- Introduce the arts to new audiences?
- Serve the needs of the elderly, persons with disabilities, lower income groups, institutionalized persons, and other populations that historically have been under-served by or had limited access to the arts community?
- Promote multi-cultural events and programming?
- Provide increased opportunities for minority involvement in the arts?
- Strengthen the arts community by encouraging organizations whose programs/activities are mutually beneficial to work together?