The National Endowment for the Humanities Preservation Assistance grants program assists libraries, museums, historical societies, archival repositories, and cultural institutions with non-matching outright grants of $6,000. These grants allow small institutions to engage a conservator, preservation librarian, archivist, or other appropriate consultant to help to improve the care and custody of their humanities collections. Some examples of eligible projects include: general preservation assessments to help draft a long-range plan for the care of collections;  establishing environmental monitoring programs; planning for instituting integrated pest management programs; studying light levels in exhibition and storage spaces and recommending appropriate methods for light control to reduce damage to collections; developing detailed plans for improving and rehousing collections  storage; developing disaster and emergency response plans; and assessing the conservation treatment needs of selected items in a collection.

These grants are directed to small intuitions (especially those that have never received an NEH grant)  that care for and have custody of humanities collections that are the focus of the application; have at least one staff member or the full-time equivalent, whether paid or unpaid; and be open and able to provide services or programs at least 120 days per year. Grant applications are submitted electronically through the grants.gov website which requires preregistration. For more information about the program contact the NEH’s Division of Preservation at 202-606-8570 or online at preservation@neh.gov. Deadline for submission is May 8, 2010 for projects beginning in January 2011. This seems like a good program for those small museums who wish to become more professional in the stewardship of their collections.

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