Awards founded by Mellon Foundation program
By Mike McCombs
The Island News
Backed by an $875,000 award from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation’s Humanities In Place program, the Beaufort County Black Chamber of Commerce (BCBCC) in July awarded Gullah Reclamation and Cultural Empowerment (GRACE) grants to 10 recipients.
The BCBCC, on Tuesday, June 29, hosted a reception to present checks to the recipients of the three-year grants aimed at preserving and promoting the cultural heritage of the Gullah/Geechee people in and around Beaufort County.
GRACE is a regranting program – the Chamber regrants a grant it received – established to ensure the stories, traditions and contributions of the Gullah people continue to thrive.
Outside of the Chamber’s participation in the South Carolina Housing Repair Program, these are the first grants the Black Chamber has issued since Marilyn Harris took the reins as Executive Director in the summer of 2023.
Harris is relieved to reach this milestone. She said the Mellon Foundation approached the Chamber in October of 2024, and quite frankly, things were not in good order. Membership was down and many of the allegations involving the Black Chamber were centered around financial mismanagement.
“For the Mellon Foundation to take the time to come and sit with me and listen to the vision for the Chamber moving forward and understand that we had a new Board of Directors and a new Executive Director and essentially a whole new team,” Harris said, “they were willing to give us an opportunity to demonstrate that I was the most competent for the position and the board was right-sized.
“I’m grateful that I have a supportive board and people in the community who are supportive of my ability to turn things around. When they listened to me and heard what my process involved, they decided to give us this opportunity to prove ourselves. … We had to prove to them that we were worth the risk.”
Harris said at every step she asked the Mellon Foundation to walk through the process with her, making sure every detail was correct. And she said the name of the Chamber’s grant program – GRACE – is appropriate because that’s what the Mellon Foundation showed.
“I wanted to be able to demonstrate, not just to Mellon, but to the community, that we are operating with integrity, that we are fiscally responsible, that we are brand new,” she said. “We’ve been given the opportunity to do that.”
The 2025 GRACE Initiative recipients include:
— Beaufort-Jasper E.O.C., $7,000
— Black Moses Freedom Festival, $1,200
— Black Veterans Village, $2,500
— De Gullah SHIPP, $5,000
— Gullah Geechee Futures, $15,000
— Lowcountry Gullah Foundation, $7,000
— Mae Legacy, dba Earth People Farms, $5,000
— Marshview Community Organic Farms, $7,000
— Responsible ARTistry, $14,000
— Love House Learning Academy, $2,500
The recipients were given checks for 80% of the of their grant July 29 with the remaining 20% to come in December.
A total of $125,000 Mellon Foundation grant monies are to be given out in 2025. The remainer of that total after these initial grants are likely to be distributed among these recipients before year’s end.
A five-person evaluation team of community leaders with expertise in finance and Gullah heritage interviewed the applicants and based its final list of recipients on cultural impact, community impact and feasibility.
The recipients receive direct legal and financial assistance, educational resources and advocacy “to ensure that the Gullah/Geechee community can preserve their cultural heriatge and maintain ownership of their ancestral lands.
According to a release from the BCBCC, the GRACE Initiative includes several key components:
— A regranting program to provide financial assistance to local preservation projects;
— Education workshops on estate planning, sustainable land use and financial literacy;
— Annual gatherings to raise awareness, provide resources and promote policy advocacy; and
— Preservation planning to ensure the longevity of Gullah/Geechee cultural sites.
Not long after the Mellon Foundation grant, the Coastal Community Foundation followed up with a $1.65 million capacity grant — “to help us rebuild.” That grant is to fund operational expenses.
Mike McCombs is the Editor of The Island News and can be reached at TheIslandNews@gmail.com.
