Two years ago Rad Health Resources awarded Smoke Works a small, $50 grant. We'd completed our first buyers' club, and never had a dime that wasn't already spend. I was elated.
Fifty bucks ain't much, but it meant to me that folks in Harm Reduction believed in us. We were validated. It may very well have kept the flames lit, helping propel us to the next chapter. It certainly influenced our profit sharing and mutual aid missions.
Two years later, in hopes of paying it forward, we've dedicated $450 to our first micro-grants. We invited underfunded, independent groups doing the work in places where it is most scarce to tell us about their missions. The response was amazing.
We narrowed it down to 7 out of more than 15 submissions, and asked volunteers at a recent event to vote.
There was not a single submission that didn't deserve all the cash, but 3 were chosen and funds have been transferred. Check our Instagram for news on the grand-grant-winner, and two runners up!