Grants

Grant applications for 2025 will open in winter 2024

The Community Festival established the grants program in the spirit of giving back to the community. Each year, ComFest invites grant applications to support and sustain programming consistent with ComFest’s principles which are rooted in community, social justice and progressive activism. Since 1997, ComFest has awarded over $675,000 in grants to local organizations.

2024 Grant Recipients

One of the ways we encourage living the ComFest Way all year-round is by giving back to the community through grants which support projects and programs consistent with ComFest’s principles. Each year we welcome grant applications from local nonprofits rooted in community, social justice, environmentalism, and progressive activism. These applications are reviewed by the Grants Committee then recommendations for what to award are presented to the General Planning Committee for consensus. In 2024 seven organizations doing fantastic work in Central Ohio received ComFest grants:

CityMusic Columbus: Summer 2024 Columbus Metropolitan Library Programs
This summer CityMusic is providing free music therapy and hands-on music education programming to children and teens at multiple library branches. Programs include a "Teen Songwriting Lab" where teens access online song creation technology and are also taught traditional songwriting strategies. A "Books 'n Beats" program focuses on pairing books with music related concepts such as drumming, singing, instrument play, and movement activities. These programs emphasize literacy skills, learning group social skills, learning appropriate ways to express emotions through music, and building self confidence through trying new experiences guided by highly trained music therapists.
citymusiccolumbus.org

ETSS Tewahedo Social Services: Sole Shop
The ETSS Sole Shop is a free store run by Ethiopian Tewahedo Social Services for immigrant and refugee families to assist in meeting their basic needs. Many of the families are newly arriving refugee families and those who have fled dangerous conditions in their home countries or are leaving human trafficking and domestic violence situations. Some come in with only the clothes on their backs. Much of the store inventory is donated, but our grant will help them to restock hygiene supplies, household items, and select clothing.
ethiotss.org

FIRST Collective: Community Engagement Programs for Transitional Housing
FIRST Collective is focused on fostering community and mutual aid, serving Columbus's unsheltered residents. Their Community Programming Project will provide activities to dozens of disabled residents that are currently living in a hotel as they await permanent housing placement. Programming will include the construction of a community garden, cooking classes, workout classes, art classes, visits to local Metro Parks and museums, skills workshops, and the creation of a mural. These serve to improve the quality of life for community members in the transitional housing program and provide them with new skills and relationships for their next chapter in permanent housing.
firstcollective614.com

The Open Shelter, Inc.: Birth Certificate & State ID Program
The Open Shelter is an advocacy center & day services shelter for the homeless and marginally-housed in central Ohio. Their State ID & Birth Certificate program helps individuals obtain their IDs, birth certificates (in- and out-of-state), and navigate obtaining social security cards free of charge. The demographic which The Open Shelter caters to unfortunately has little or no verifying documents of their identity due to their living situations being so precarious. People cannot get a job, medical support, and housing without any one of those documents; this program is helping to open these doors.
theopenshelter.org

Pro-Choice Ohio Foundation: Patients to Advocates Fellowship
The Patients to Advocates Fellowship Program (P2A) sets out to develop well-prepared abortion storytellers with first-hand knowledge who can safely advocate for access to legal and safe abortion care locally, through their work in their local communities, with the media, and with lawmakers. This several month program helps build an alumni network of leaders to support Pro-Choice Ohio in its mission to protect, as a fundamental right and value, a woman’s freedom to make personal decisions regarding the full range of reproductive choices through education, training, organizing, legal action, and public policy.
prochoiceohio.org

This Must Be The Place: The (Other) Columbus Crew: A Team of Lifesavers
This Must Be The Place brings nasal naloxone to the public with a goal to destigmatize and normalize the carrying of Narcan, and provides the education around it to prevent accidental overdoses. Last ComFest they were able to distribute over 1000 kits of free Narcan, as well as shared training of its use and engaged in conversations about the importance of having it readily available. This year they want to distribute over 10,000 kits within Franklin County! By equipping the people of Columbus with Narcan, regardless of whether or not they use drugs, they aim to build a crew of potential lifesavers to help keep people alive through the deadly fentanyl epidemic.
betheplace.org

WCBE-FM: AD Converter for multi-track recording
WCBE 90.5 FM is a public radio station operated by employees of Columbus City Schools and the Columbus Board of Education. Our grant will allow WCBE to purchase equipment which will help the station provide real-life professional working experiences for their student interns. The new Analog/Digital converter unit will enable the student interns to perform multi-track recording in their training of audio production, radio broadcasting and podcasting. WCBE listeners in Central Ohio and beyond will be informed and entertained by the audio content broadcasted and streamed online.
wcbe.org