Organizations and Events

Grant Helps Relocate Festival in Springfield

2019 Springfield Jazz and Roots Festival

Springfield, MA – MassDevelopment has awarded a $10,000 grant to Blues to Green, Inc., which will use funds to relocate the Springfield Jazz & Roots Festival downtown to the Springfield Transformative Development Initiative (TDI) district to help catalyze economic recovery and support Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC)-owned businesses in the neighborhood.

Festival events will also take place at local parks and businesses, including three emerging Black-owned businesses, and will provide employment and exposure opportunities to local Springfield artists. Blues to Green, Inc. will also crowdfund this summer. If the organization reaches its $40,000 goal it will receive an additional $40,000 matching grant from MassDevelopment.

The funds are awarded through MassDevelopment’s Commonwealth Places COVID-19 Response Round: Resurgent Places, which was made available specifically to assist local economic recovery efforts as community partners prepare public spaces and commercial districts to serve residents and visitors.

In December 2020, MassDevelopment announced the availability of $390,000 in funding for a second Commonwealth Places COVID-19 Response Round: Resurgent Places. Nonprofits and other community groups can apply to MassDevelopment for seed grants of between $250 to $7,500 to fund inclusive community engagement, visioning, and local capacity building that will support future placemaking efforts, or implementation grants of up to $50,000 to execute a placemaking project. For implementation grants, up to $10,000 per project may be awarded as an unmatched grant; awards greater than $10,000 must be matched with crowdfunding donations.