Our grants are catalysts!
There’s no doubt that Impact San Antonio’s High Impact Grants are a major benefit for the nonprofits that receive them. But for some of our grantee agencies, the funds they receive from us are just the beginning.
Those agencies have used the prestige of receiving a major Impact SA grant as a catalyst to apply for others. And other grant-making foundations, organizations and individual donors are impressed!
Two agencies that have done quite well with this strategy are the Magik Theatre and the Esperanza Peace & Justice Center.
Magik Theatre received a 2017 High Impact Grant from us to address accessibility issues. Our grant ultimately paid for the renovation and enlargement of the two lobby restrooms, making them wheelchair accessible and adding a shower and other amenities for the casts of their plays. Other grants have addressed accessibility issues in the building, which was constructed in 1893 and needed serious updating.
The theater has posted the logos of their funders on a wall in their lobby for all to see.
“The key to it all was the first grant we received from Impact San Antonio,” said Frank Villani, Magik Theatre CEO. “It taught us two things: first, to think holistically about everything we needed, and second, to break that down into parts.
“The work we did for the Impact SA grant transferred to the other grant applications we did,” he said, citing the rigorous process that Impact SA requires for its grant applicants.
Development Manager Eric Schneeman added, “Because of the prestige of the Impact SA grant, you can build in a continuing plan with other funders.”
The benefits of the Impact SA grant were soon evident, with a $100,000 grant in December 2017 from the Lee Family Foundation to repair and update the backstage area. Subsequent grants included $500,000 over five years from the Kelleher Charitable Foundation; $50,000 from the Meadows Foundation; $35,000 from the Circle Bar Foundation, Greehey Family Foundation and Valero Benefit for Children; $100,000 from the Nancy Smith Hurd Foundation; $100,000 from the Kronkosky Charitable Foundation; $20,000 from the Pryor Charitable Trust; and $30,000 from the TND Family Foundation. All are being used for accessibility updates, including a wheelchair seating area at the front of the theater and a ramp with an awning outside, Villani said.
Esperanza’s project, the Museo del Westside, received a High Impact Grant from Impact SA in 2020. The Museo project involves renovating and enlarging the old Ruben’s Ice House to become a museum highlighting the history and culture of San Antonio’s West Side.
Graciela Sanchez, director of Esperanza, believes that the Impact SA grant helped other funding organizations recognize the widespread community support for the Museo project. She can cite a considerable list of grants that have been received since the Impact SA grant, including $100,000 from the San Antonio Area Foundation and $50,000 from an individual donor and long-term supporter of Esperanza in 2022. The agency also was awarded a Humanities in Place grant of $1.6 million over three years from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in 2021. And it received a $1 million grant in 2021 from philanthropist MacKenzie Scott.
In addition, Esperanza received a $500,000 Infrastructure and Capacity Building Challenge Grant in 2022 from the National Endowment for the Humanities, which requires a 3:1 match. The grant will be matched by the $1.5 million in Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone funding awarded by the City of San Antonio for the Rinconcito project in 2021. Rinconcito is the larger project that surrounds and includes the Museo.
In terms of programming at the Museo del Westside, Esperanza was awarded a $75,000 Public Humanities Planning Grant in 2021 from the NEH to plan the opening exhibition at the Museo, which will be a survey of Westside history titled Historias del Westside. Finally, Esperanza was awarded a $50,000 Inspire! Grants for Small Museums award from the federal Institute for Museum and Library Services in 2022 to do an assessment of the Museo’s collections, purchase any needed storage materials for the archives, and hire a consultant to select the software that will be used to manage the Museo’s digital and material collections.
Esperanza was the first agency to request a letter of support from Impact SA to include with their other grant applications, and that is now done routinely for grant recipients, said Audrey Laird, co-chair of Grant Oversight and Outcomes on the Impact SA board of directors.
“Impact SA’s rigorous and objective grant application and review process is run by our members and helps ensure that the most impactful grant proposals are selected as finalists,” she said. “Once a grant award is made, we publicize the achievement and extend support letters that can be used with other funders.”
Elizabeth Garretson, vice president of Operations for Impact SA, said, “I continue to be blown away by the amazing good our grant recipients are able to do in our community with the funds they’ve received from Impact SA. It is doubly rewarding to hear from those who’ve shared that going through our process has helped them make other strong applications and secure further funding. In this way, it feels like our grants keep on giving.”