Flame On Vegan was one of two grand prize winners of Springfield Creative City Collective’s “For the Love of Springfield Grant Program”
Photo by Chucky Crespo Photography
SPRINGFIELD — For the third year in a row, Springfield Creative City Collective has offered an avenue for individuals and smaller organizations to thrive and advance their missions.
The coalition recently unveiled its third cohort of the “For the Love of Springfield Grant Program,” awarding a total of $50,000 to individuals, small businesses and nonprofits in Springfield “dedicated to nurturing and sustaining the creative economy of Springfield.”
Tiffany Allecia, the founder and executive director of SCCC, said “For the Love of Springfield” was created three years ago to help marginalized communities further their ideas, concepts, initiatives and programs through grant money.
“We wanted to create a program where people who are usually left out, marginalized communities, smaller organizations, people who don’t even believe that they’re able to access free money for their ideas, have the opportunity to apply and receive funding,” Allecia said.
The grant program was made possible by a $535,000 MassDevelopment TDI and Barr Foundation grant that SCCC received in 2022 to boost arts-based economic development in Springfield. The money allowed the coalition to facilitate many initiatives and events throughout the city and create the “For the Love of Springfield” program.
After awarding $30,000 in the first year and $50,000 in the second, SCCC once again granted $50,000 to this year’s recipients of the program, including $10,000 each to local alkaline/vegan/plant-based restaurant Flame On Vegan and IG N Company, a local nonprofit that supports and enlightens at-risk youth through performance art.
Flame On Vegan will use the money to open a culinary academy that introduces the community to a more vegetable-enriched, vegan-aligned lifestyle by showing people different ways to make healthy food taste good.
Allecia said this initiative is important, especially in a world where cardiovascular disease and high blood pressure has historically crippled Black and brown people.
“We know from a historical context, Black and brown and impoverished communities often got scraps, and we had season, flavor, fatten and salt to the point that we can make oxtail and pig feet taste amazing, but it is destroying our community,” Allecia said. “So, [Flame On Vegan] is designing a program that shows [the community] ‘these are the different ways we can eat food, and this is how we can make to taste good without sedating us.’”
IG N, meanwhile, will use its $10,000 to spearhead a 12-week modeling workshop for creative youth and young adults with physical and mental disabilities, including those with autism and behavioral health issues.
Allecia said participants will practice modeling, learn about the fashion industry through guest speakers and eventually take part in a New York Fashion Week for a day.
“We’re so excited about that program because oftentimes unfortunately humans with disabilities get left out of creative experiences even though we have research that shows that arts and culture is beneficial to everyone,” Allecia said. “Not just beneficial in a therapeutic way, but in a self-expression and a healthy lived experience way.”
Aside from those initiatives, SCCC also awarded five grants of $2,000 each and four grants of $5,000 each. One of those awardees, Discovery High School’s Polybotz robotics team, will utilize its $5,000 to direct a travel show that teaches elementary school students about science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics-or STEAM-fields.
The team of 25 students recently won a series of robotics competitions against competitors from across New England, taking first place in the New England District competition at Western New England University and winning a Rising All Star Award at an Eastern States Exposition competition.
Allecia said it is amazing to see a primarily Black and brown robotics team from Springfield have the success they have had, and she looks forward to supporting their future endeavor with the travel show.
“We are going into a world where we need all the creative thinkers we can get, so we’re excited about that,” Allecia said.
After securing 80 applications in the first year and 40 applications in the second, SCCC received around 60 applications for the “For the Love of Springfield Grant Program” this year. While Allecia commended the community for expressing such profound interest in the program, she said she plans to advocate for more money at the state level because this may be the last year SCCC is able to run the program.
With more money in hand, Allecia said SCCC could award more people and support the arts on a wider scale.
“We need more funding for the arts in this state, and I’m able to show [the Legislature], look, we only have 10 or 11 awards a year, but look at these dozens and dozens of ideas,” Allecia said. “There’s so many great ideas out there.”
Readers can learn more about the “For the Love of Springfield Grant Program” by visiting the SCCC website: sccc413.com/exhibitions/sccc.
According to its mission statement, the SCCC is a coalition of economic development stakeholders focused on the transformation and revitalization of the Springfield creative and cultural economy.
Other grant money awardees include 413 Elite Foundation, True roots, Women of Color Health Equity Collective and Caribbean-American Heritage Month Celebration Committee Inc.
