Hudson Valley organizations were on Thursday awarded more than $300,000 of a state total of $900,000 in grants to support not-for-profit organizations involved with stewardship of state parks, trails, historic sites and public lands. The 27 grants support partner group efforts to raise private funds for capital projects, perform maintenance and beautification undertakings, provide educational programming, and promote public use of parks through hosting of special events.
The Park and Trail Partnership Grants program is funded through the state Environmental Protection Fund. This round of awards will be matched by over $250,000 in private funds.
“These grants will help leverage the energy and talents of our partners to do even more to improve parks, historic sites and trails across New York.” state parks commissioner Erik Kulleseid said.
Hudson Valley awards included among other things $100,000 for the Bannerman Castle Trust to hire a development officer to identify, cultivate, solicit, and steward major gift donors and prospects, $32,000 for the Friends of Mills Mansion to create reproduction draperies for the library at Staatsburgh, and $26,427 for the Friends of the Old Croton Aqueduct to improve the exterior of the visitor center and to install an arch and mechanical device from the Croton Dam to help visitors better understand the functioning of the aqueduct.
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