ITHACA, N.Y. — A handful of local nonprofits working in the arts and culture sector will receive thousands in funding from the state government in the coming months to pay for necessities like salaries and performance space.

The funding comes from grants supported and allocated by the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA), which announced this year’s awardees Monday in a statement from Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office. 

The grants are also available to individual artists like Ithaca’s own Eleanor Henderson, who applied to receive funding to write a novel titled “The Galaxy” over the course of 2025. 

The Opus Ithaca School of Music, a nonprofit based out of St. Paul’s United Methodist Church in downtown Ithaca, was among this year’s awardees and will receive $40,000 from NYSCA. 

Andi Merrill, executive director at Opus, said they’ve been receiving grants from NYSCA for six years now. Without the annual influx of cash, which Merrill said gets directly deposited into the organization’s primary bank account, “Opus would be struggling a lot.” 

The annual NYSCA grant helps Opus, as well as other organizations locally and across the state, fund the parts of the organization that are more difficult to fundraise for — like hiring new staff, expanding programming spaces and paying utility bills.

Merrill said it’s easier for the school to fundraise to cover needs like scholarship funds, for example. This coming year, Merrill said she’s using a portion of the grant to cover the salary of a new staff member. 

Grants and their amounts are awarded based on yearly applications and financial reports that organizations update regularly at NYSCA’s request.

In 2023, Merrill said Opus received $30,000, which she described as “a little disappointing.” But similar state grants kept Opus’ doors open in 2021 after the COVID-19 pandemic and continue to provide significant support for nonprofits of all sizes. 

Historic Ithaca, another nonprofit awardee, was awarded $49,500 to spend on organizational expenses. 

Bethany Parisi, the organization’s assistant director, said they also received slightly more from the fund than last year. Parisi said that the increase is likely due to Historic Ithaca’s community outreach programming that’s expanded significantly over the last year. 

Parisi said they’ve spent a significant amount of time developing programs and classes in the organization’s architectural salvage store, Significant Elements. 

Merrill said that while she and her staff are celebrating the news, she’s worried about next year. Grants from NYSCA are funded through the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), an independent federal agency that financially supports arts activities throughout the U.S. 

In 2017, during his first term in office, President-elect Donald Trump proposed a federal budget that eliminated the NEA entirely. Trump was the first president in history to do so, according to reporting from The New York Times. 

Ultimately Trump was unsuccessful in eliminating the fund during his first term, with Congress voting to maintain funding for the NEA. Trump proposed eliminating the NEA in each of his proposed federal budgets until 2021, when President Joe Biden ascended to office. 

“We are definitely nervous about what’s going to happen next year,” Merrill said. “We hope that this, and what we’ve just received, will continue. We’re just definitely on guard.” 

The 2025 NYSCA grants were awarded to over 2,000 nonprofit organizations and individual artists, according to the statement. 

CTA, which NYSCA awarded the largest amount in total to support, did not immediately respond for comment.