Please Consider Donating for Cultural Programming

Yesterday, Christine Lind Hage sent the following message to Council list, asking for short-notice donations to help ALA meet a challenge grant for the Cultural Communities Fund (CCF), which “will support local libraries across the country in establishing community and cultural programs.” As a librarian who believes that programming is one of the skills that sets apart our profession, I’d like to ask you to consider donating or pledging a donation to this worthy cause. Note that pledges and donations need to be received by August 31.

Christine wrote,

I am writing to ask for your support on a short timeline.

The ALA Public Programs Office has established a new endowment fund to support cultural programming, the Cultural Communities Fund (CCF). As part of this effort, ALA is undertaking a campaign to raise $1,050,000 to match a $350,000 challenge grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

To date, they have raised more than $150,000 from individuals and institutions. For this particular challenge NEH will not count any monies that come from ALA–or any unit of ALA. Dollars eligible for the NEH match need to come from individuals, libraries, foundations–any source that is not ALA.

Challenge grants are challenging-and have annual targets to meet.
Presently, the deadline for the current year is August 31, and they still have $11,474 to go. If ALA does not meet this goal, they will not receive the match.

As someone who understands the importance of the ALA Public Programs Office and its initiatives, would you consider a donation on behalf of your library or yourself to help meet this goal?

To make your donation online, go to https://cs.ala.org/onlinegift/ (select Cultural Communities Fund from drop-down menu). Checks may be made payable to the American Library Association (CCF in note line) and mailed to Deb Robertson, ALA Public Programs Office, 50 E. Huron St., Chicago, IL 60611. The Public Programs Office is also happy to e-mail a pledge card to you if you desire. Please send requests for pledge cards to lhayes@ala.org. Pledges received by August 31 count in their entirety, while payments can be made until July 2007.

More information is at http://www.ala.org/ccf. If you have any questions, please contact Deb Robertson, director of the ALA Public Programs Office at (800) 545-2433 x 5057 or droberts@ala.org.

PLA Division Representative to ALA Council Director, Clinton-Macomb Public Library 40900 Romeo Plank Road Clinton Township, MI 48038-2955 USA