Newport Library Wins Challenge Grant for Children and Youth Area Upgrades

A Newport nonprofit group is among 17 organizations will share more than $31,000 in grants for everything from documenting the status of endangered historic properties to putting a 2,000-page diary on-line through the Archive, Document, Display and Disseminate (ADDD) Fund at the Rhode Island Foundation.

The Newport Public Library was awarded an $1,800 challenge grant to fund work on its children’s and youth areas. The library will receive $1 for every $1 it raises from other sources over $35,000 to a maximum of $1,800.

“By offering incentives to strengthen libraries and other civic, cultural and literacy-focused organizations, we are expanding their role as community centers that stimulate dialogue around critical issues,” said philanthropist Herman Rose, who created the fund in 1986.

The fund has two primary goals: to increase access to information through archiving, documenting, displaying or disseminating print, digital or other material and to provide challenge grants for fundraising campaigns for the acquisition of equipment, special collections and publications among other material.

Among the other recipients are the Bristol Historical and Preservation Society, which received $1,500 to continue cataloguing its early collections; and the Prudence Island Historical and Preservation Society, which was awarded $932 to purchase display panels and accessories, a floor-standing binder display and photo frames to house an exhibit on the history of one-room schools on Prudence Island.

The Rhode Island Foundation is the largest and most comprehensive funder of nonprofit organizations in Rhode Island. In 2014, the Foundation awarded $34.8 million in grants to organizations addressing the state’s most pressing issues and needs of diverse communities. Through leadership, fundraising and grantmaking activities, often in partnership with individuals and organizations, the Foundation is helping Rhode Island reach its true potential. For more information, visit www.rifoundation.org.