MANAGE YOUR GRANT

If you are an on-year applicant, you will receive comments for each criteria. There are no comments provided for off-year applicants and Partnership grants. If there are Recommendations or Stipulations, you should note them. Recommendations are not binding but should be addressed in future applications. Stipulations are contractually binding and must be complied with to receive funding.

It is important that your legislators understand the impact of the arts in their communities. Send an email or letter to the Governor and your state legislators thanking them for supporting our funding. Here are examples: for funding of arts education programs, and for funding of all other types of programs. You will attach them to your interim report. 

Annual: Attach to Interim Report

Express: Attach to Final Report

Review the Grant Checklist above. Both Annual and Express are similar.

Annual: Your annual award letter outlines the next steps: send message to the Governor and your state legislators, determine your ability to match, and complete the interim report.

Express: There is no interim report. Sign the grant agreement to be able to invoice for funds.

This is required before you submit any invoices. Log into SmartSimple, locate Requires Attention > Pending Report. Find the FY26 Interim Report (Draft), select Open. Details on the matching requirement can be found on the Financial Summary. Once the Interim Report is submitted, you will receive a confirmation on the screen and an email with a PDF attachment.  The “My Applications” section will show the Status of the Pending Interim Report. Your program specialist will review and approve the Report. Your organization’s authorizing official will receive an email notifying them when a Grant Agreement is available for electronic signature. Your organization will be notified via email when the Final Report is generated.

All organizations receiving Missouri Arts Council grant over $5,000 must enroll in E-Verify (a federal online authorization program), provide a Memorandum of Understanding, AND annually sign the Certification form that confirms ongoing compliance with E-Verify. This requirement ensures compliance with state legislation. In addition, Missouri Arts Council grantees must check their new employees’ immigration status with E-Verify.

Even though the federal guidelines apply to employees hired by the organization, Missouri’s law includes contracted staff that is internal to the organization and contracted to work on an ongoing basis. For example, executive directors, artistic directors, actors, and technicians. Even if the contract employee receives a 1099, rather than a W-2, and does not withhold taxes, according to Missouri’s statute, they are considered employees. E-Verify is not necessary for individuals contracted to work for one or two events. Both the St. Louis and Kansas City Volunteer Lawyers and Accountants for the Arts offices can assist you with information on E-Verify and Form I-9 (Employment Eligibility Verification).

The authorizing official will receive a grant agreement by email from Signeasy. You must digitally sign in Signeasy, provide your typed name, title, and date of signing. This will ensure the information is logged and tracked. Once completed, the Missouri Arts Council will sign. The authorizing official will receive an email with two documents, a signature certificate and the grant agreement. Keep both files for your records. Only then will you be able to submit an invoice for payment. If you do not sign the grant agreement within the timeline, it will be voided and delay your ability to be reimbursed.

You must inform the Missouri Arts Council in advance if there are changes to your grant after you receive your grant agreement. For changes to programs, schedules, releasing funds, contact information, address, authorizing official, and legal name of organization use Notes in the SmartSimple. For banking changes contact your program specialist. All changes must be approved by the Missouri Arts Council.

To use Notes, login to SmartSimple, under My Application, open your grant application, select Notes on the left, select the + sign, choose note to Missouri Arts, enter the changes and press save. This will associate the message with your application and retain it for future access. Your change{s) will be reviewed by your program specialist. 

Payment of the Missouri Arts Council grant is always made on a reimbursement basis. Organizations must have sufficient cash reserves or incoming revenue to pay for all expenses upfront and wait for reimbursement. It is difficult to estimate processing time because there are many possible reasons for delays.

To receive payment of the grant, all Missouri Arts Council grant recipients must be registered with the State of Missouri as a vendor with current address and banking information for Electronic Funds Transfer. Keep copies of the signed invoice(s) and supporting documents for four years.

Be sure you collect this basic data on your project throughout the grant cycle.

We measure in-person attendance at the events we fund. This includes arts events, participation in arts learning, or other types of activities in which people were directly involved with artists or the arts. You should include actual audience numbers based on paid/free admissions or seats filled. Subscribers to a literary publication should be counted. 

WHAT NOT TO INCLUDE: Do not include artists, personnel, and volunteers in this count. Do not inflate numbers or count repeat attendees. Do not count individuals reached through TV, radio or cable broadcasts, the Internet, or other media. Do not count virtual attendance.

We measure the artists providing services directly involved with the MAC-funded project. Include living artists whose work is represented in an exhibition regardless of whether the work was provided by the artist or by an institution. We measure the full-time personnel (working 35 or more hours per week on work identified with the MAC-funded project) and part-time (working less than 35 hours per week on work identified with the MAC-funded project) and volunteers (include board members) whose services are specifically identified with MAC-funded project.

You will be required to report where the project took place, the address, and the number of days on site.

An organization must maintain its eligibility throughout the grant period. The Missouri Arts Council will confirm the Missouri-based nonprofit eligibility when processing the application and double-check eligibility before paying invoice for reimbursement. Any ineligibility issue(s) must be corrected before proceeding.

Missouri Arts Council funding will be jeopardized if any of the following occurs during the grant period:
– Organization doesn’t file annual form 990 with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) for the most recently completed fiscal year.
– IRS revokes the organization’s tax-exempt status.
– Organization doesn’t file timely registration reports with the Missouri Secretary of State’s office (SOS) or its nonprofit status is administratively dissolved.
– Organization changes to a non-Missouri address as indicated with the IRS records, Form 990 returns, SOS nonprofit registration records (registered agent and organization’s principal place of business or corporate headquarters), and/or other public records, such as the organization’s website and Facebook page.

Additional Eligibility Requirement: SAM UEI
All Missouri Arts Council applicants must obtain a SAM.gov-assigned unique entity identifier (UEI). For details view SAM.gov.