RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — A New York-based private organization, the Mellon Foundation, will give more than $16 million to Richmond.
The money will go toward projects that explore and preserve Richmond’s history.
Eleven million of the money is planned to go toward an interactive center that will educate people on the full history of Shockoe Bottom.
The center is part of a larger project called the Shockoe Heritage Campus which will have a memorial park and a National Slavery Museum. It’s a space that will memorialize the history of slavery in the city.
“This is a significant step toward bringing the Heritage Campus to fruition and toward telling the story of enslaved and freed people,” said Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney.
The rest of the grant money will support things like the Valentine Museum, Untold RVA, Cary Forward, Reclaiming the Monument and the JXN Project.
Talking about Richmond, the Mellon Foundation’s president, Elizabeth Alexander said, “The people of this city are lifting up the collective memory of its historic Black communities, unflinchingly addressing the city’s past as the capital of the state with the most enslaved people prior to the Civil War.”
The Richmond City Council will have the chance to approve an ordinance to accept the money at the Jan. 9 council meeting. The city is expected to make a formal announcement about the grant then.
