BALTIMORE — Baltimore's longtime Arena Players theater - the country's oldest continually-operating African-American community theater - just officially got a huge influx of federal funds.
Federal legislators representing West Baltimore announced Thursday that the theater, which is on McCulloh Street just east of MLK Jr., Boulevard, is receiving $4 million to fund critical building upgrades.
U.S. Senators Chris Van Hollen and Ben Cardin and Congressman Kweisi Mfume noted the funds are part of a recent community omnibus funding bill.
Mfume's financial note about the project calls Arena Players "a cherished pillar" in Baltimore and beyond, and points out that 80 percent of the participants in the organization's 55-year-old Youth Theatre Program come from low-income/underserved communities.
The note says:
"This project would be a valuable use of taxpayer funds because API has a proud history of community service and outstanding dramatic achievements. Its work as a space for intercultural exchange and preservation is only possible through the use of its historic building."
The Arena Players discussed their past, present and future with WMAR in 2020.
The omnibus bill also includes $2 million to help turn the historic Upton Mansion into the Afro Charities headquarters and AFRO American Newspapers archive; $2 million to upgrade the National Great Blacks in Wax Museum; $2 million to help build the multi-use, art/performance-oriented Sanaa Center on Pennsylvania Avenue; $2 million to renovate the houses of 75 low-income families; $2 million to upgrade the Park West Belvedere location of the Park West Health System; $2.3 million to build The Star Community Family Life Center by Morning Star Baptist Church in Woodlawn; $2.3 million to upgrade the Eager Park area in East Baltimore; $3 million to upgrade the Maryland Center for Veterans Education and Training on North High Street; $1.5 million to renovate the Druid Heights Maggie Quille Center; $1.2 million for Helping Up Mission to buy and revitalize a blighted property for affordable housing; and $1.75 million to restore Juanita Jackson Mitchell's historic office at the Juanita Jackson Mitchell Legal Center on Druid Hill Avenue.
