Supporting Community-Based Archives Through the Covid-19 Crisis
Update 4/20/2020: NEH has released its application for emergency funding. Applications due May 11th.
Update 4/21/2020: NEH has also sent $30 Million to the 56 state humanities councils. The state councils have started offering emergency funding. Please visit the websites of the state humanities councils to find out about applying for funds. There are several application deadlines to consider.
Update 4/21/2020: NEA has opened its application process to offer emergency funding to arts organizations impacted by Covid19. See application instructions on their website.
Update 4/21/2020: IMLS has made $30 Million in emergency funding available to states through the States Libraries Administrative Agencies (SLAA). See how much of the money your state received and contact your SLAA to apply.
Update 5/5/2020: Mellon Foundation issues call for 2020 Community-Based Archives grant proposals. Application due July 1st.
Update 5/10/2020: IMLS announced a new emergency funding opportunity: Cares Act Grants for Museums and Libraries. Applications due June 12th.
The spread of the Coronavirus (Covid-19) and our collective actions to mitigate its impact on our personal safety, public health, and the economy, has changed our lives in permanent ways that won’t be fully realized for a long time. As we’ve watched the closure of businesses and the loss of jobs mounting over the past month, I can’t help but worry about how cultural memory organizations like community-based archives, already facing tremendous resource constraints, will make it through the end of 2020. The layoffs and closures are already happening in the community memory sector and will continue in the coming months, and community-based archives will suffer losses as well. As funding and other resources are being put forward to support community memory organizations, like museums, archives, libraries, and arts organizations, equitable access and distribution of those those resources should be foundational. Smaller organizations with less resources such as community-based archives, and especially those that serve already marginalized and oppressed communities, will be at a disadvantage when it comes to accessing these resources. We should ensure that the mechanisms put in place to qualify and apply for these emergency funds are equitable and they consider the capacity of cultural memory organizations that will be seeking support.
Like many of you, I have been overwhelmed by the impact of the pandemic and how to cope with the personal and professional disruptions. In my attempts at adjusting to the situation, I’m generally feeling helpless. Beyond caring for my family and doing our part to be socially responsible by staying at home and not putting the public at further risk, it has been difficult to focus on meaningful ways to contribute outside of our own situation. By the way we already loved our kids teachers, but now we have an even deeper appreciation for them because OUR KIDS ARE AT HOME 24 HOURS A DAY, 7 DAYS A WEEK. So their teachers, Mrs. Reed and Ms. Cruz, deserve all the praise, and pay, and benefits when this thing is over.
Anyway, I think maybe one thing we can do at this time is to try and find ways to continue doing some of the small things that bring us a little bit of peace and joy and to share some of those things with our networks when we are able. So our family has been spending more time in the garden enjoying the flowers and taking pictures of the insects, birds, and butterflies that come hang out. It’s been fun exploring for bugs with the kids and generally being more attentive to the simple beauty that surrounds us every day that we may not always have time to appreciate.
I’m also thinking this is a good time to do a little advocacy on behalf of community-based archives, as these organizations will be facing tough times in the next few months and years because of the virus’ impact on social life and the economy. Many of them are already struggling financially and the current crisis could be a death blow to some. But at the same time community-based archives and small community museums have survived lean times in the past while contributing immeasurable value to the communities where they exist. So while they will undoubtedly struggle along with the rest of the community memory sector, they could also serve as valuable models for how to operate and continue to serve your community in times of crisis.
I was excited to see that NEH, NEA, and IMLS were each allocated funding in the latest rescue bill passed by Congress. The levels of funding are obviously not enough to address the economic hit cultural memory organizations will take but it will certainly help. The American Alliance of Museum estimates that museums are losing up to $33 Million per day and 30% of museums may close because of the crisis. As the crisis continues, the MET estimates they could lose $100 Million in 2020 through revenue losses and layoffs. According to the National Humanities Alliance, “the legislation also extends forgivable Small Business Administration loans to nonprofit organizations-including museums, historic sites, independent libraries, and scholarly societies-with fewer than 500 employees to cover operational expenses.” My hope is that the funds will be equitably shared with a diverse group of cultural memory organizations, including community-based archives that have been struggling to access funding in the past. Even though we have seen funders take some steps to support community-based archives recently, for example, IMLS grant programs and funded projects and the Mellon Foundation grants for community-based archives, we need to continue our efforts to support these invaluable cultural memory organizations. Community-based archives like the Southern California Library, South Asian American Digital Archive, South Side Community Arts Center, the Shorefront Legacy Center, and the Bay Area Lesbian Archives, and many more need our support now more than ever.
As we highlighted in our Architecting Sustainable Futures report, typically funding organizations overlook community-based archives as legitimate sites where historical preservation and community education takes place, and the barriers to accessing grants are so high that the larger, more well resourced organizations like academic libraries, have much higher chances of securing funding. Because of Covid-19, some non-profit funders are now removing these barriers and making money available faster to grantees, which is a welcome development. These kinds of responses from humanities and library/archives funders would be welcomed as well to mitigate potential harm to already struggling community-based archives. If these archives are not supported through the crisis and some are forced to close their doors, academic libraries and other well resourced organizations that are already better positioned to weather the crisis, may also gain from their misfortune when the post-Coronavirus collection acquisitions begin to happen. This is a very real possibility that should not sit well with us.
“We must refuse the rules of inclusion, and vocabularies of recognition and legitimacy that are meant to contain our histories. We should not echo articulations that we do not already exist in the archive. We are not marginal or other to the archive, but integral to it. We may be silenced or made invisible, but we have always been present.” Yusef Omowale, Director — Southern California Library
Yusef Omowale reminds us that people who have been socially, politically, and economically excluded from the collective benefits that dominant society enjoy, have always found ways to exist and preserve their culture despite significant challenges. In that view, maybe many of these spaces will still be here after Covid-19 is under control because they have always done more with less and relied on the community as partners. From a more optimistic perspective, perhaps community-based archives are the model for sustainability, innovation, and creativity that we need in our current moment of crisis as they can provide experienced guidance other cultural memory organizations can use to navigate through the lean times ahead. Perhaps they can offer the wisdom and practicality that cultural memory organizations will need to rely on for the next several months and years.
I certainly believe community-based archives will have a lot to offer but they will need help as well. While the legitimacy and necessity of community-based archives have never been in question, at least not in the communities that gave them life and that continue sustain them, the coming storm of disruptions to their operations post Covid-19 will be significant. Especially as the people in those same sustaining communities, already suffering from the effects of inequality, are being disproportionately infected with the virus and will be the most likely to be overlooked in the economic relief effort. As grant funders gear up to support the cultural memory sector, my hope is that some of this emergency funding will also be shared with community-based archives and other resource strapped spaces that specifically focus on preserving the histories of Black, Indigenous, Latinx, GLBTQ, and other marginalized and oppressed people.
Beside funders doing their part to make sure emergency funding is equitably shared with a diverse set of cultural memory organizations, this is also an opportunity for community-based archives to come together to support each other through mutual aid, collectives, and other resource sharing models. While there are long term plans for community-based archives to explore shared resource models such as the Community Archives Collaborative, the immediacy of the moment calls for supporting each other now. Community-based archives can share money with each other to keep the lights on, co-develop online exhibits, programming and collections based curriculum that could be used in online teaching, share staff expertise to apply for grants, share technology such as video conferencing subscriptions, or simply create opportunities to virtually network and counsel each other. Finding creative ways to support each other through this crisis would create a solid foundation that can help community-based archives emerge on the other side of this thing in a stronger position.
While community-based archives that operate as official non-profits are able to apply for relief to cover salaries, rent, and other operating expenses through the new legislation, the reality of these spaces accessing any funds without help or favorable application mechanisms is probably low. First, many of them either don’t have or have lost their non-profit status because of capacity issues, and second, these archives were already unable to access funding in more stable times because they simply did not have the resources, capacity, or access to the networks of people who are knowledgeable about these funding opportunities and how to complete the applications. So presumably many of them will be left out this funding opportunity as well. If the new emergency funding now available through NEH, NEA, IMLS and others like the Getty Trust don’t make their way to community-based archives, we have to consider what might happen to their collections if they have to permanently close? Will this mean the loss of access to valuable archival collections, the end of impactful programming, and the shuttering of safe spaces for the communities where these archives are based and that will be most impacted by the virus? These are possibilities community-based archives and their advocates have to prepare for, but my hope is they won’t materialize.
In the meantime, I’ll continue to do what I can to support by offering some modest compensation to community-based archives that want to share their stories on the Sustainable Futures blog. While I know it’s difficult for many to focus on work right now, it is also a good time for community-based archives to advocate for themselves and share how they are planning for a post Covid-19 world and also share some of the strategies they have employed in the past to weather crises while maintaining their collections, organizations, and community. Check out the blog and reach out to me on Twitter (@BergisJules) or by email at bergis.jules@gmail.com if you are interested in contributing.
