Malden Programs Receive $21K in Cultural Council Grants

[Editor's note: The following information derives from a City of Malden press statement.]

Mayor Gary Christenson and Malden Cultural Council co-chairwomen Erika Field and Candace Julyan recently announced that the city is the recipient of 24 grants totaling $21,626 for cultural programs in Malden.

Awards range from $225 to $2,500. Recipients include Housing Families, Malden Latino Council, Mystic Valley Elder Services and North Shore Black Women's Association. A complete list of recipients and awards can be found on the Massachusetts Cultural Council website.

The Malden Cultural Council is part of a network of 329 Local Cultural Councils (LCC) serving all 351 cities and towns in the Commonwealth. The LCC Program is the largest grassroots cultural funding network in the nation, supporting thousands of community-based projects in the arts, sciences and humanities each year.

The state legislature provides an annual appropriation to the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency, which then allocates funds to each community. Decisions about which activities to support are made at the community level by a board of municipally appointed volunteers. The members of the Malden Cultural Council are Erika Field, William Filios, Stacey Gilchrist, Candace Julyan, Michele Marcinowski, Roberta Noland, Toni Pepe Dan, Jennifer Psallidas, Paula Spizziri and Eric Wild.

"It's the local volunteers who really make this system work," Christenson said. "They make limited resources go as far as possible and make tough decisions about which projects should be supported in Malden. Thanks to our local Cultural Council, students' lives will be enriched through field trips, our elder community will enjoy live musical performances and families will benefit from programming at the library."

Statewide, more than $2.34 million will be distributed by local cultural councils in 2014. Grants will support an enormous range of grass-roots activities, including concerts, exhibitions, radio and video productions, school field trips, after-school youth programs, writing and visual arts workshops, historical preservation efforts, lectures, cultural celebrations, and nature and science education programs.

The Malden Cultural Council will seek applications for 2015 in the fall. Information and forms are available online at Massachusetts Cultural Council website and are due Oct. 15. The council encourages interested parties to connect with council members before the application process and to share ideas and ask questions.

For more information about the Malden Cultural Council, follow them on Facebook and Twitter.