Sustainable Tompkins Neighborhood Mini-Grants support initiatives of Tompkins County residents and small organizations with “seed money” to make their neighborhoods more sustainable.
Applications are reviewed quarterly by the Mini-Grant Council, comprised of local citizens and members of Sustainable Tompkins board and staff. Awards range from $150 to $750.
For more details, and to apply, click here.
The Neighborhood Mini-grant program is funded through individual donations, sponsorships, and grants. Together, we can transform our community into a more just and sustainable one. Every gift—large or small—helps, so please take a moment to complete the
Online Gift form.
Some of Our 2009 Sustainable Tompkins Mini-Grant Recipients
Co-creating a Sustainable Homestead
The Dacha Project is a group of six individuals working together to create a self-sustainable, educational homestead in rural Freeville, NY. They used a mini-grant in the fall of 2009 to purchase a Brumby water pump, driven by compressed air instead of electricity, and the first of its kind in Tompkins County. So far they have established a fruit and nut tree orchard, organic garden, and a straw bale cottage, and provided several educational tours to groups of students.
Community Quilting
The Granny Squares is an initiative by a small group of senior women of Titus Towers in Ithaca. A mini-grant award in the summer of 2009 helped them procure a long arm quilting machine. The process of creating beautiful quilts together improves their quality of life through shared, purposeful activities, and strengthens their ability to rely upon each other. Auctioning the final products, which are both artistic and useful, helps their group work towards economic self-reliance.
Maple Sugaring Education connects youth with nature in an urban setting. Forty-five Beverly J Martin kindergarten students and their teachers participated in the pilot program, launched with the support of a mini-grant in the winter of 2009. The program combined math and science classroom projects with outdoor activities. It was designed by Steve Gabriel of the Finger Lakes Permaculture Institute, who would like to bring it to more classrooms, after-school programs, home-schoolers and community centers in Tompkins County. For more info, visit “Sugaring in the Schools” at Sapsquatch.
Inter-generational Pizza Baking Project
A number of the residents of the Linderman Creek low-income housing project and the senior facility came together to learn how to make pizzas, under the guidance of Pat Dutt from the West Hill Civic Association. Joining the project were a number senior citizens who happened to be experienced bakers, and they enjoyed teaching the younger bakers what to do. Pizza ingredients included many of fresh garden products (basil, tomatoes, peppers, etc) that were grown in the new West Hill Community Garden.
Outreach with Ithaca’s Burmese/Karen Community
Using a Sustainable Tompkins mini-grant, SewGreen was able to offer special daylong sewing classes to two groups of Karen teenagers. They worked through the Ithaca City School District to make connections to sponsors and eventually to the teens themselves. Because of their background, most of the teens—all girls—had never used a sewing machine. They were at first very shy and hesitant about asking questions, but as the day progressed, typical teenage exuberance burst forth. They were very proud of the projects they made, and at one point, three of the younger girls literally squealed with delight and jumped up and down.
