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Program closed, thank you for your interest
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The City of Portland program, Urgency/Stability Support for Artists, is a part of the American Rescue Plan: Investing in Portland, in the priority area of Community Health and Safety.
The Urgency/Stability program is designed to support artists and other creatives working in the arts who identify as under-served or under-represented, including Black, Indigenous, Latinx, Asian, Pacific Islander and People of Color; LGBTQIA+ artists; and artists with disabilities. The program supports artists and other creatives working in the arts who live in the City of Portland, have lost income or opportunities due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, and have either outstanding costs or ongoing financial needs that are impacting their practice. Program funds come from Federal grant funds from the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) and the process is administered by the Regional Arts & Culture Council.
This program is open to individual artists and creative professionals at all levels of their careers, in a broad variety of disciplines. Applicants must live in the City of Portland, have demonstrated loss due to COVID-19 and self-identify as an artist or creative an under-served or under-represented community, with an ongoing practice creating work and sharing it with the community.
There are two types of support available through a single, two-track application.
Track One: Urgency Grants, $1,000- $5,000: Beneficiaries receive Urgency Grants based on critical needs or an emergency situation resulting in outstanding costs which pose a threat to the viability of the individual’s ongoing creative engagement. Please note, additional documentation of loss or emergency will be required for this track.
Track Two: Stability Grants, $500-$3,000: Beneficiaries receive Stability Grants based on an individual’s needs, which support their ongoing creative engagement.
Neither of these tracks are project-specific. These funds are intended to be an investment in artists and creatives. Grants are not contingent upon the creation or completion of a new project.
You may apply in only one of the tracks. In your application, you will be asked to submit documentation of your artistic or creative practice, current need, and financial loss related to COVID-19.
Grant awards are based on funds available, panel rankings, and the City of Portland’s desire to serve artists from under-served and under-represented communities.
Applications must be submitted in the RACC Opportunity Portal by Wednesday, June 1, 2022 at 5pm. RACC will communicate funding decisions to all applicants in August 2022.
RACC is serving as the administrating entity for this program, however it is not considered a RACC grant, therefore the status of any current RACC Grants you may have do not impact your eligibility for this program.
- Read the full Urgency/Stability Grant guidelines, 用中文（表达, bằng tiếng việt, на русском, en español.
- Watch the previously recorded Instagram Live Info Session from Thursday, May 12th
- Apply through the RACC Opportunity Portal.
Click here to view the Urgency/Stability FAQ, or download the FAQ here
Q: What do Urgency/Stability Grants support?
A: This program is designed to support artists and creatives to continue their practice. This can mean meeting critical needs or daily needs that may be preventing you from doing your work. Needs could be personal, health related, supplies and equipment, or simply time. This program is not project based.
Q: Who can apply?
A: You may apply for this program if you are an artists or creative who currently resides in the City of Portland (www.portlandmaps.com), identify as a member of a historically under-served or under-represented community, and has documented loss related to COVID-19.
Q: My address ends in Portland, Oregon, does that mean I’m eligible to apply?
A: The City of Portland area is not defined by mailing addresses that end in Portland, Oregon 97xxx. Please check www.PortlandMaps.com to confirm if you are located within the jurisdiction of the City of Portland service districts.
Q: If I am an individual with an LLC can I still apply?
A: Yes, applicants must be an individual artist or creative and provide RACC with a W-9 form upon notification that you have been awarded a grant. The W-9 form may be filled out for yourself as an individual, your sole-proprietorship, or your single-member LLC, and must have a Social Security Number (SSN), Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN), or a single-member LLC Employer Identification Number (EIN). Make sure that your Applicant Eligibility Profile in the RACC Opportunity Portal reflects how you are legally organized and prepared to receive grant income.
Q: Can I still apply if I have an open RACC grant?
A: Yes, this grant is a program of the City of Portland, which RACC is administering. Current/ongoing RACC grants would not impact your eligibility for this program.
Q: How are award amounts determined?
A: The Review panel will select grantees and set award amounts. The award amount recommendations will be based on review criteria scoring, priority scoring, number of applicants, number of applications submitted in each track, and on funding strategies from the reviewers.
Q: What kind of documentation is needed to show loss due to covid?
A: Documentation loss of income or opportunity due to COVID is a Federal requirement related to the American Rescue Plan Act funds. In this section of the application you can upload whatever paperwork you may have to help demonstrate reduced or cancelled opportunities, this could be things like:
- communications from a venue, event booker, collaborator, employer in the form of emails, social media posts or messages about covid changes that impacted you.
- a PDF/word doc that you create which lists or has links about events or opportunities that you did in the past or had lined up and then were cancelled due to covid.
- your personal records of what money you made in pre-covid years vs what you made in 2020 or 2021.
Q: Why aren’t organizations/businesses/schools eligible?
A: This grant opportunity is one of the initiatives of the City of Portland’s Community Health and Safety program, funded by Federal American Rescue Plan Act funds. The eligibility for this initiative is set by the City of Portland, and is focused on under-served or under-represented artists who have been negatively impacted by COVID-19.
Q: Do I need to do a project for this grant?
A: No, this grant is not project-specific, but to support recovery from an emergency or the ongoing work by the artist applicant. Grants awards are unrestricted.
Q: If awarded, will I need to submit a report on the grant?
A: No, there is no project requirement attached to these grants. The funds are meant to support artists as flexibly as possible, responding to emergencies and investing in their practices. However, if you receive a grant, you will have the opportunity to let the City of Portland know how the grant impacted your work through an optional survey.
Q: If awarded, will my information be shared?
A: RACC will report names and award amounts to the City of Portland, who will report to the Federal Government, but this information will not be publicly available.
Q: When do I have to use the funds by?
A: There is no requirement from RACC or the City of Portland for beneficiaries to expend the grant funds by a certain date. However, as a recipient of grant income, if the total you receive from RACC is more than $600 in one year you will receive a 1099-NEC for the award amount at the end of the calendar year in which you are paid.
Q: The RACC Opportunity Portal won’t let me access this program or submit.
A: There are several steps to take if you are not able to view this grant in the online system.
1. Make sure that your Applicant Profile is up-to-date. Not every grant program is open to all applicants based on criteria you have entered in your profile, and many applicants have inadvertently created more than one account, as well. You must be an individual artist who resides in the City of Portland to access the application.
2. Next, if you notice anything acting differently than expected, please first check to make sure you are using a compatible browser that is up to date (Chrome is preferred, Firefox and MS Edge work smoothly, Safari and Internet Explorer are not supported).
3. If you haven’t found a user error, send us an email through our feedback form or email grants@racc.org and we’ll try to sort out the issue for you and other users.
Q: Why did the eligibility criteria change?
A: In April, the City of Portland collaborated with RACC to launch a program supporting artists in under-represented communities, using Federal grant funds from the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA).
In May, the program was temporarily paused to amend the eligibility criteria to include all artists who identify as under-served or under-represented, including but not limited to, Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC), LGBTQIA+ artists and artist with disabilities. Priority consideration will still be given to artists from communities that have been disproportionately impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
We appreciate the continued collaboration and look forward to distributing over $450,000 in urgency and stability support this summer.
If you have a question that isn’t answered here or if you would like to get in touch with our team please email grants@racc.org
All applicants are welcome to contact RACC Grants Team at grants@racc.org if you have questions about your application or need assistance with the application process.