ShaVonne Davis was enjoying a quiet Friday night with her husband when she received a startling email from the National Endowment for the Arts.
The email read: “The NEA is updating its grantmaking policy priorities to focus funding on projects that reflect the nation's rich artistic heritage and creativity as prioritized by the President.”
Davis showed her husband, and they were both stunned to see that Maroon 9 Community Enrichment Organization, a Fort Worth nonprofit, had just lost $10,000 in federal funding.
“I was devastated, but I wanted to handle it with grace,” she said. “I honestly didn't wanna tell anyone, I'll be honest.”
Maroon 9 is one of 13 North Texas arts organizations that lost federal funding when the NEA terminated some awards in May. In total, those organizations lost $346,900. The sudden loss left many groups confused and scrambling to adapt.
Founded in 2016 by Davis’ mother, Cynthia Banks, Maroon 9 offers free year-round enrichment programs for middle and high school students in Tarrant County. It focuses on teaching creative expression through theater, dance and music while also providing mental health resources, life skills training, and college and career readiness programs.
The organization has a small staff of eight. About 30 middle and high school students are in the current summer program. The group is close-knit. Some staff members pick up students who lack transportation with their own cars so they can attend the program.
“We have a wealth of students who are looking for a creative outlet and looking to be in a group that is nonjudgmental,” she said.
For six years, the nonprofit has put on a summer play. This year, the organization budgeted $25,000 for the production, and for the first time, $10,000 was expected to come for the NEA.
“Didn't really realize how much of a big deal it was until we got it,” Davis said.
This year’s play was Harriet Tubman:Take My Hand and Follow Me. Without NEA funds, 40% of their summer budget was gone. Alanna Stern is strategic operations manager for Maroon 9. She said she worried about how the funding loss would affect students.
“It just kind of once again reiterated how, in a lot of people's eyes, the arts aren't necessarily a priority and how the rug can kind of just be ripped from up under you at any given time,” Stern said.
Organizations who lost NEA funding quickly put out statements urging for community support. Some of them, such as the Welman Project, mentioned Maroon 9 as an organization that also needed help. After Davis saw other groups putting out statements, she called for an emergency board meeting and shortly afterward, Maroon 9 released its own statement announcing a campaign to raise $10,000.
“I was really nervous because I just want to make sure that how the community perceives us is always in a positive light,” she said. “I wasn't sure if people who weren't familiar with what was going on would be like, ‘Well, they lost their funding. Why? What did they do wrong?’ ”
Within the first day, Maroon 9 raised about $725 in donations.
“I was so in shock because we had never just come to the community for funds,” Davis said. “I transferred it right then. I was like OK, just in case this disappears, let me go ahead and get this over.”
And money kept rolling in. Two days later, Davis woke up to multiple PayPal donations after TikTokker Ehleshea Anderson created a series of videos urging her followers to support the Black youth theater program. People from all over the world donated, helping Maroon 9 exceed their $10,000 goal.
“Theater has the power to change lives,” Anderson said. “And in any art form where a child gets to just dedicate their heart and soul to something after school, their life is already on a different trajectory.”
With the new support, Maroon 9’s production of Harriet Tubman: Take My Hand and Follow Me could continue. Plus, the organization learned to raise money in a new way and is planning on launching a $1 million capital campaign.
”This was a confirmation that we cannot solely rely on grant funding in general,” Davis said. “It definitely was a confirmation that the community sees us, the community values us, and that if we come back with a really big project, which is our own space, that people will support.”
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