MINNEAPOLIS — The Minneapolis Foundation will receive a massive grant to help assist local environmental projects and programs.
As part of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Environmental Justice Thriving Communities Grantmaking program, the Minneapolis Foundation will receive $50 million to help fund environmental efforts for underinvested communities. The program, which was created by the Inflation Reduction Act, is a way to make federal funding more accessible to more communities.
“Thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act, we’re finally able to help close the gap so communities who have been disproportionately impacted by pollution will have the support they need to fight for a cleaner, healthier future. Local organizations like the Minneapolis Foundation have lacked the funding needed to accomplish this work and this changes that,” said Sen. Tina Smith in a press release. “This $50 million investment is a game-changer for environmental justice in Minnesota and will have a ripple effect across the state and the region, allowing the Minneapolis Foundation and its partners to distribute funds that fuel projects that will help build a cleaner future for us all.”
According to the EPA, beginning in the summer of 2024, communities will be able to apply to the Minneapolis Foundation for a subgrant to go toward a wide range of projects, including local cleanups, local emergency preparedness and disaster resiliency programs, environmental workforce development programs for local jobs reducing greenhouse gas emissions, fenceline air quality and asthma-related projects, healthy homes programs, and projects addressing illegal dumping.
“This funding will strengthen the ability of communities throughout the Great Lakes region to think locally but act globally, delivering large-scale federal resources to scores of organizations and individuals who together are building the movement for climate justice,” said R.T. Rybak, President and CEO of the Minneapolis Foundation.
The Minneapolis Foundation will work with the Midwest Environmental Justice Network, the RE-AMP Network and NDN Collective and have working relationships with tribes, indigenous-led and grassroot organizations across Minnesota, Michigan, Indiana Ohio, Wisconsin and 35 tribal nations.
“Our communities must be at the center of climate and environmental solutions,” said Eartha Borer-Bell, director of the Midwest Environmental Justice Network. “We are committed to creating a grantmaking process that is accountable to environmental justice communities and that will build the long-term capacity of grassroots organizations to address priority public health and environmental challenges.”
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