The Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment (MOME) and the Theatrical Teamsters Local 817, in partnership with the Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City, have announced that El Puente, Socrates Sculpture Park, and Urban Arts Partnership have been selected to receive “Made in NY” community grants provided by the Theatrical Teamsters. As part of its commitment to New York City, the Theatrical Teamsters Local 817 has donated three $50,000 grants to the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment through the Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City to support community enrichment in local neighborhoods in New York City. The grants aim to help community-based organizations with a media/film or arts program that serves high-need communities. The recipients of the grants were announced at the start of Tribeca Family Festival Street Fair.
“At the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, we’re committed to supporting our local communities, and we are grateful to Tommy O’Donnell and the Theatrical Teamsters for their generous donation,” said Commissioner Cynthia López, Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment. “The three organizations selected to receive the community grants share a mission of helping young people develop their talents through media and the arts. This not only leads to opportunities for young New Yorkers but will further expand the pool of talented New Yorkers for the media and entertainment industry.”
“Theatrical Teamsters Local 817 has always been about ‘people helping people,’ focused on education, family, and community,” said Francis J. Connolly, Jr., secretary-treasurer, Teamsters Local 817. “Today Local 817 is supporting New York City communities through these grants, which will help young New Yorkers discover their talents.”
“The Mayor’s Fund is a longstanding catalyst for public-private partnerships aimed at supporting New Yorkers and New York’s diverse communities, and we’re proud to support this innovative partnership between Theatrical Teamsters Local 817 and MOME,” said Darren Bloch, executive director, Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City. “This collaboration will help these groups build upon the richness of artistic opportunities for youth across the City, and we can’t wait to see the work that comes out of these worthy organizations as a result of this partnership.”
“New York City is a mecca for arts and culture,” said New York City Council Majority Leader and Chair of the Cultural Affairs Committee, Jimmy Van Bramer. “By supporting Socrates Sculpture Park, El Puente, and the Urban Arts Partnership the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment is enabling dynamic arts organizations to reach the next generation of our City’s filmmakers, actors, and stagehands. Through these grants our youth will get the firsthand experience they need to be a part of the industries that make our City one of the best in the world.”
El Puente (Spanish for “the bridge”), founded in 1982 by Luis Garden Acosta, is a human rights organization that fulfills its mission to inspire and nurture leadership for peace and justice by promoting holistic community/youth development through the engagement of youth and adults in the arts, education, public health, environmental advocacy, and social justice. The community grant will support El Puente’s Williamsburg Leadership Center (WLC), a holistic youth leadership development center that offers free summer, afterschool, and evening programming in the arts, leadership training, mentoring, and academic support.
Thirty years ago, Socrates Sculpture Park became New York City’s first public space dedicated to providing artists with opportunities to envision, realize, and exhibit large-scale sculpture and multi-media installations. Today, the park’s unique waterfront environment is known for encouraging strong interaction between artists, their artworks, and a broad and diverse public–a relationship reinforced through open accessibility and a dynamic roster of free cultural programming. Socrates Sculpture Park will use the community grant in a variety of ways including supporting a dynamic and diverse roster of free community programming and socially engaging cultural events, ranging from art-making workshops that introduce art-making practices to at least 8,000 local Queens children and youth to a multi-disciplinary performance series. The grant will also support the 17th Annual Outdoor Cinema Series–a free festival of international film, music, dance, and food that serves over 7,000 people per year. Additionally the funding will help a media partnership with the Long Island City-based public high school, Academy for Careers in Television and Film, through which it commissions at least five student-created videos annually to document the park’s programs and exhibitions. Through the partnership, students work alongside industry professionals and Socrates staff, receiving training and hands-on experience in all aspects of managing and working in a professional production company.
Co-founded by Rosie Perez in 1991, Urban Arts Partnership’s mission is to advance the intellectual, social, and artistic development of underserved public school students through arts-integrated education programs to close the achievement gap. Approaching its 25th year, UAP employs 130 teaching artists to serve 15,000 students and 500 teachers in over 100 Title 1 public schools in New York City. Funding from the community grant will support UAP’s Academy and Alumni Scholars programs.
The Academy is a year-round, out-of-school time program that offers rigorous media arts instruction, academic advocacy, structured college readiness support, and leadership development for underserved public high school students. Academy students create artworks that address pressing issues of social justice, establishing themselves as youth leaders and advocates of positive social change. Students attend UAP’s state-of-the-art facility in Soho to develop pre-professional art skills in a self-selected major that allows them to have their voices heard in the context of their communities. These art forms include filmmaking, music production, photography + graphic design, theater, poetry, dance and coding + game design. Alumni Scholars are Academy alumni and college students serving as paid assistant Teaching Artists and peer mentors in UAP’s dropout prevention program, receiving college success, counseling, and career exploration support. Scholars benefit from counseling from UAP social workers and are exposed to real world jobs, establishing a strong community of youth as they transition to adulthood.
The Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment serves as the one stop shop for the entertainment industry over the past five decades, promoting the City of New York as a center of creativity, issuing permits for productions filming on public property, and facilitating production throughout the five boroughs. Today, the City hosts record levels of episodic television series as well as hundreds of films each year. Last year, more than 240 films shot in New York City, and so for the 2014-2015 season, 46 episodic series have been produced in the City. The City’s production industry employs 130,000 New Yorkers and contributes billions of dollars to the local economy.
The Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City, chaired by First Lady Chirlane McCray, is a 501(c) (3) not-for-profit organization that facilitates high-impact public-private partnerships throughout New York City’s five boroughs. The Fund leverages individual, philanthropic, and corporate partnerships to support public programs advancing key Mayoral and agency priorities. The Fund is focused on supporting public programs in areas including mental health, youth workforce development, immigration and citizenship, domestic violence, financial empowerment, and support for young men and women of color.
