Matching Grant - Cultural Arts & Visitors' Center

Help make a difference for rural area Veterans, Senior Citizens and Youths! A new local investor last week challenged the nonprofits FW Coleman Theatre (Mississippi), and Stir Up The Gift Enterprise (Tennessee) to match funds to purchase a 235-acre recreational and housing farmland in Tennessee for development.

Programs That We Offer

The vision for a Center is that we will be able to offer a wide variety of programs and services, including:

• Health and wellness programs

• Transportation services

• Employment assistance

• Volunteer and civic engagement opportunities

• Social and recreational activities

• Educational and arts programs

• Intergenerational programs

The Need For Funding

To begin and maintain operations, we understand from experience that The Center must leverage resources from a variety of sources. Expanding means that The Center will offer cultural arts and tourism information but expand and serve the community as a Veterans and Senior Citizens Service Center as well.

Yes, we are applying to receive funding sources from local municipalities' county tax dollars. However, we are a rural area company. Therefore, funding is not as widespread as it is within the two small municipalities that govern our unincorporated area. So other sources must include fundraising events and public and private donations from you and your participant contributions. We welcome any amount of assistance to be able to match the funds offered.

Benefits and Impact

• Research shows older adults who participate in senior center programs can learn to manage and delay the onset of chronic disease and experience measurable improvements in their physical, social, spiritual, emotional, mental, and economic well-being.

• Today, many centers are reinventing themselves to meet the needs and desires of three generations of older adults. Baby Boomers now constitute more than two-thirds of the 50+ population. Centers are developing new programs and opportunities for this dynamic generation of older adults and have an eye toward the future with the leading age of Generation X turning 60 in 2025.

• Modernizing Cultural Arts Centers and Museums As Resource Centers

• Modernizing Centers to provide leadership, training, technical assistance, and a clearinghouse of innovative programs and strategies.

Your financial help will ensure that the housing, cultural art center, outdoor agricultural museum, and senior center services will have the capacity, tools, and support needed to meet the current and future needs of a rapidly changing diverse audience across the U.S.

Thanks in advance for contributing to this cause that means so much to me.

Returning to my hometown of Cayce spurred me to develop better living conditions by letting people know about the Community Home Repair Program. Then after being in the city for 38 years, I saw how a community took a block at a street corner and developed a park. I began a park and community garden for senior citizens on a one-acre lot. Some had to walk and exercise. But there are no sidewalks to help them stay safe from the heavy dirt-road traffic. The money ran out that I had before the park was completed. We want to use the funds first to complete the park project.

Secondly, funds would be used to purchase a building to continue the development of the Culture Arts and Visitors' Center. Two areas available now have enough room to use the present structure and add an agricultural museum area, gardening area, and recreational space.

The locale is near Highway 72 and 57 Tennessee and Mississippi State lines which would make usage of the Center accessible to residents of both States. If you have questions, contact our Support Team. The picture is the area to be purchased and developed.