January 27, 2022 (New York, NY)—The Community of Literary Magazines & Presses is pleased to announce it has been approved to receive an American Rescue Plan grant from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to help the arts and cultural sector recover from the pandemic. CLMP is recommended to receive $150,000 and may use this funding to save jobs and to fund operations and facilities, health and safety supplies, and marketing and promotional efforts to encourage attendance and participation. The NEA will award grants totaling $57,750,000 to 567 arts organizations in all 50 states, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Washington, DC.
“Our nation’s arts sector has been among the hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. The National Endowment for the Arts’ American Rescue Plan funding will help arts organizations, such as CLMP, rebuild and reopen,” said Dr. Maria Rosario Jackson, chair of the NEA. “The arts are crucial in helping America’s communities heal, unite, and inspire, as well as essential to our nation’s economic recovery.”
“CLMP is a small but mighty service organization that, over the past two years, has worked tirelessly to respond to the many new challenges literary magazines and presses in our country have faced,” said Executive Director Mary Gannon. “We’ve significantly increased our technical assistance events and resources, our regranting programs, and our advocacy efforts for the unique and essential role independent literary publishers play in the publishing ecosystem. We are extremely grateful to the NEA for its generous support, which will allow us to sustain this additional work and continue to build on it.”
CLMP will use the American Rescue Plan grant to hire staff to support the execution of its evolving programs and to serve its growing membership of independent literary magazines and presses, located in 49 of the 50 states, as well as Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico.
The American Rescue Plan was signed into law in March 2021 when the NEA was provided $135 million for the arts sector. The funding for organizations is the third installment providing more than $57.7 million for arts organizations. In April 2021, the NEA announced $52 million (40 percent) in ARP funding would be allocated to 62 state, jurisdictional, and regional arts organizations for regranting through their respective programs. The second installment in November 2021 allocated $20.2 million to 66 local arts agencies for subgranting to local artists and art organizations.
For more information on the NEA’s American Rescue Plan grants, including the full list of arts organizations funded in this announcement, visit www.arts.gov/COVID-19/the-american-rescue-plan.
About the Community of Literary Magazines and Presses (CLMP)
CLMP ensures a vibrant, diverse literary landscape by helping mission-driven independent literary magazines and presses thrive. Since 1967, CLMP has provided publishers with funding and technical assistance; facilitated peer-to-peer learning and group action; served as a dependable, essential hub for best practices, resources, and nurturing community support; and connected publishers with other groups of literary stakeholders, including readers, writers, booksellers, librarians, educators, presenting organizations, and funders. Along with directly serving 800+ publishers located in almost every state in the country, CLMP administers the Lit Mag Adoption program, which provides educators and students with discounted magazine subscriptions; the annual Indie Lit Fair, in partnership with the PEN World Voices Festival; the Firecracker Awards for Independently Published Literature, which celebrate magazines and books that make a significant contribution to our literary culture, and the newly established $10,000 Constellation Award, given to honor an independent literary press that is led by and/or champions the writing of people of color for excellence in publishing.
