Samples of Eligible and Ineligible Projects
Eligible projects:
• A neighborhood association organizing a planting day to revive a neglected park
• A college student group building green roofs on dorms
• A gardening club teaching neighborhood children to garden
• A church group creating a stream buffer to clean a polluted river
• An outdoors club installing living ground cover to connect green corridors and protect waterways
• A student group conducting water testing on a field trip to a local waterway
• A bike group creating more bike parking spaces in their neighborhood
• A non-profit providing diesel retrofits on school bus engines so children breathe cleaner air
• A community garden group installing a rainwater harvest system
• A high school student group performing an energy assessment of their school
• A community-supported agriculture program hosting an educational farm visit
Ineligible projects:
• Applications for planning projects, campaigns, ongoing programs
• Projects that involve political advocacy, lobbying, electioneering
• Projects with budgets that mostly cover operating expenses, general overhead, capital funding, and acquisition of major office equipment
• Projects that involve research or individual scholarship not connected with a public program
• Projects that pay salary for full-time employees that is usually borne by the sponsoring organization
• Projects that involve alcoholic beverages
• Projects or events that charge admission or resources that charge a user fee (nominal donations may be requested but cannot be required)
• Projects which consist of printing paper advertising materials and direct mail. We encourage groups to consider advertising their projects with web resources like blogs and newspapers and via email listserves and websites. You can also use ioby.org to organize volunteers and participants to your event, assuming it meets our criteria. We make exceptions to this printing rule only when you can adequately prove that a community can only be reached by printed material, mailed and/or distributing fliers. In this case, we encourage you to use community boards rather than direct mail.
If your project meets our criteria and you're ready, submit your project application now. Need more information? Read our tips on applying.
