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Bill would prioritize first-time and small-budget arts grantees; nonprofits caution against instability
Summary
House Bill 757 would add statutory priorities for the Cultural and Aesthetic Grant Program to favor applicants who have received few or no prior awards and those with smaller annual budgets. Nonprofit advocates said the change risks penalizing organizations that have built capacity and rely on predictable funding.
Representative John Fitzpatrick, House District 76, presented House Bill 757 to Montana House Subcommittee F as a companion effort to other grant-related bills. Fitzpatrick said the bill would add two prioritization criteria to the Cultural and Aesthetic Grant Program: (1) preference for applicants who have not previously received grants or have received only a small number of awards, and (2) priority for organizations with smaller annual budgets.
"What we're suggesting here is that the law should give priority to first people who haven't had very much grants and secondly folks that have small budgets where the grant would actually be helpful," Fitzpatrick said. He described a four-by-four matrix the subcommittee used internally that cross-references number of prior awards against an…
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