Pictured above L-R: Photo 1: Rand Pinson, Maria Sykes, Jack Forinash, founders of Epicenter; Photo 2: Maria Sykes, Jack Forinash, Matt Mueller, Rand Pinson, outside of the future Epicenter office just after receiving the RBEG grant

Today the Epicenter celebrates an important milestone: with the receipt of our final reimbursement, the first grant that served to create the Epicenter as we know it today has been officially completed.

Here’s the original announcement from September 23, 2009, along with an energy-exuberant video made when we found out.

Here’s a news release from USDA Rural Development regarding the “success story” of this grant.

A USDA Rural Development Rural Business Enterprise Grant (RBEG) of $88,800 was written in spring of 2009 and granted in fall of 2009. In the past 25 months, this important first major support has been used to purchase and renovate the century-old building that is now the Epicenter office ($60,000 paying for materials and labor) along with covering basic operational ($20,000) and administration ($8,800) expenses. We were also able to raise, with your direct support, another $20,000 in personal donations as matching funds for the grant.

The receipt of the grant allowed us to hire our original interns, Wes Funes and Josh Hilliard. It also served to hire Matt Mueller for construction labor, Aimee O’Carroll as a Young Professional designer, & paid Maria Sykes, Jack Forinash, Kelly Gregory, Ted Ranney, and Wes Funes as laborers and Young Professionals. This grant paid for projects like the one on this miserable windy day, this drywall installation, tile refurbishing and painting and allowed us to help people like Leila and Bear (both of whom passed away in 2011).

The establishment that this grant has provided has allowed us to host the many other crew members that weren’t directly paid out of this grant. Seven teams of AmeriCorps NCCCs, AmeriCorps VISTAs including Hayley Crooks and summer VISTAs Dustin Willis, Mark Porth, Kelly Gregory, Ted Ranney, and Keegan Wenzler. More recently, our Frontier Fellowship campaign has hosted seven more crew members in 2011.

At this important moment, we look forward to the future of the Epicenter. We sincerely thank USDA Rural Development for their original and on-going support, namely Dave Conine (State Director), Perry Mathews (Rural Business Program Director), Luann Wilson, and the late Liz Black, Stephanie Cecil, and Kathy Byrnes at our regional office. We also thank all of our supporters that contributed tax-deductible donations to create the match and capital funds required for this grant and to our many honorary crew members.

That cast-iron sink is still for sale, by the way.

Consider supporting the Epicenter in 2012 through a much-appreciated donation as we look to continue focusing on working from within this context because of our belief that “people and place matter.” You can also help us by purchasing handmade goods on our Etsy store. We promise to write you a sincere thank you and send a little gift from the Frontier. Here’s to 2012!

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