The eastern Kenai Peninsula has little in common with Niagra Falls or the Mississippi Delta. What they do all share is the designation of “National Heritage Area” — meaning, they’re among 55 sites the federal government recognizes as culturally and ecologically significant to the U.S. and its history.
The Kenai Mountains-Turnagain Arm National Heritage Area, or KMTA, is the only one of those sites in Alaska. As such, it gets funding from Congress each year, about half of which goes toward an annual project grant.
KMTA is soliciting projects for its 2021 grant cycle. The application window closes March 12.
“On average, we grant about $100,000 a year for community-based projects," said Jessica Szelag KMTA’s executive director.
“The three lenses to think about as far as what your project might be able to accomplish is, is it preserving something, is it protecting something, or is it promoting something about the Heritage Area?”
KMTA encompasses the area from Seward to Anchorage, including Cooper Landing, Hope and Whittier.
The KMTA team also runs education programs and supports trail work in the area. But Szelag said the grant program is the organization's “bread and butter.” They’ve doled out $1.2 million to projects over the last 11 years.
Grantees partner with sponsors and match the funds they receive with cash, in-kind donations or volunteer labor of their own.
Applicants don’t have to be from the area to submit a project. But their proposals do have to meet KMTA’s mission.
“Which is to preserve, protect and promote the cultural, scenic natural and cultural resources of the area," Szelag said.
Unlike National Parks, National Heritage Areas encompass towns and cities. So projects are often about the people who live in those communities.
Like a 2014 documentary series, created by students in Seward and with support from Alaska Public Media, called “This is Now and That was Then, Stories that Weave through the Eastern Kenai Peninsula.”
Grantees have also created multimedia interview projects in Cooper Landing, organized trail maintenance workshops in Girdwood and restored a Quonset hut in Hope.
The prompt is broad. That’s because KMTA covers a lot of ground.
“It’s really the story of how people have traveled through this corridor for centuries and used it for hunting, travel, transportation with the railroad or driving along the Seward Highway," Szelag said. "And then people living in the communities that are encompassed by the Heritage Area now.”
There’s a virtual information session at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday for those thinking of applying. The KMTA board will choose winning projects in May.
To sign up for that session and apply for the program, visit kmtacorridor.org.
