Community event grants provide seed funding for new or up-and-coming festivals or events that demonstrate goals to enhance arts, culture, heritage and alignment with the Social Policy.
The City understands that festivals and events are vital to advancing the quality of life for all citizens in Airdrie and these events have a positive effect on social well-being. Council’s strategic vision is to enhance the unique arts, culture and recreational aspects of Airdrie and to demonstrate the value our City places on diversity, inclusion and connectedness.
Event grant application process
Community festival and event grants are intended to support the operations of festival and event producing organizations and can be directed to support the costs of:
General operations and administration;
Festival and event production (insurance, marketing, etc.); and/or
Festival and event programming
Organizations can apply once per year to the program stream they are eligible for:
First time festivals and events: Grant requests for up to $2500 to support organizers bringing new (first year) events to Airdrie that are expected to draw more than 200 attendees. City of Airdrie gift-in-kind contributions such as facility fee waivers will be considered and factored in as part of the request.
Up and coming festivals and events: Grant requests of up to $5,000 to support organizers for events that are in year 2 or 3 of a reoccurring festival or event with an attendance of more than 200 but less than 10,000. Up and coming events with a demonstrated attendance of more than 10,000 can be considered for up to $10,000 in grant funding. City of Airdrie gift-in-kind contributions such as facility fee waivers will be considered and factored in as part of the request.
Applications are open to organizations producing a festival or event for the citizens of Airdrie.
Applications will be accepted throughout the year and reviewed every quarter until all available grant funds for the year have been allocated.
2023 intake periods
Spring intake runs Jan. 1 – March 31, 2023. Funding announcements will be made on or before April 30, 2023.
Summer intake runs May 1 - July 1, 2023. Funding announcements will be made on or before July 31, 2023
Fall/Winter intake runs Sept. 1 – Nov. 30, 2023. Funding announcements will be made before the end of Dec. 2023
Applications made after Dec. 15, 2023, will be considered for 2024 community event grants.
Event grant decisions and approvals
Applications will be reviewed, assessed and grants paid out every quarter. Agreements and final reporting guidelines will be provided to applicants who receive a grant.
Grant recipients will be required to enter into a standard grant agreement with the City of Airdrie, which includes:
Agreement for registered not-for-profit societies; or
Agreement for community event organizer/group that does not have Government of Alberta society status.
Organizations receiving a grant through the community festival and event program will also be required to:
Acknowledge the City of Airdrie as a sponsor on their promotional materials
Submit a final report and/or respond to a survey upon completion of the festival or event.
Grant recipients will also be asked to submit a final report and/or respond to a survey upon completion of the festival or event to help the City of Airdrie evaluate this program.
A formal review will be completed at the end of the funding year. Process improvements will be made based on measurement, feedback, learnings, and participant reporting.
For questions or concerns, please
Ineligible organizations and activities
Applications will not be accepted from the following types of organizations:
Political or trade union organizations
Degree and diploma granting educational institutes such as colleges and universities
For-profit organizations
Organizations that have an outstanding grant agreement with the City of Airdrie. Outstanding grant agreements may be caused by failure to submit a final grant report or having not yet met the deliverables of a previous grant agreement.
Applications will not be accepted for the following types of activities:
Festivals and events that are for-profit
Festivals and events that are private (members or invite-only) or not easily accessible to the general public
Festivals or events that do not serve the citizens of Airdrie
Not sure if you are eligible?
before completing your application to discuss your eligibility if you need more assistance. Applications deemed ineligible will not be assessed.
Definition of a festival or event
A festival or event is a temporary gathering of people to recognize and celebrate the arts, culture and/or historical attributes of Airdrie.
To be supported by this program a festival or event must have the following characteristics:
Unique or special from everyday occurrences
Open and accessible to the public (free or low cost)
Alignment with the social policy first time event which is a unique event that has never been held in the City of Airdrie in the past.
Definition of an up and coming event
A unique event that is in year 2 or 3 of a reoccurring festival or event.