irs program accomplishments · form 990 part iii · fy2024
What they reported doing
- #1 primary $43KRescuing Tibbetts Brook - The Redmoon project was conceived to increase public engagement with landmark daylighting of Tibbetts Brook in the NW Bronx. Redmoons workshops and research is leading up to installations on bridges crossing the planned location for daylighting Tibbetts Brook.
- #2 $104KWaterways // Cloudbursts - Project is dedicated to coalesce a city-wide network of sites and people dedicated to public engagement around flooding and water related issues - physical, ecological, social and economic. In 2024 began a collaboration with the NYC Department of Environmental Protection to engage vulnerable communities to build awareness of dangerous Cloudburst sites. Also began a series of Walks, Workshop and other Projects.
named programs · 6 · from sources
What they call their work
Daylighting Waters | Grounding Voices
A participatory film and performance project by Miguel Braceli that uses braiding as a metaphor for watershed connectivity and community input in the daylighting master plan.
Estamos en el Agua (We’re in the Water)
A community newspaper artwork by Emilio Martinez Poppe that documents resident stories and practical tools for confronting cloudbursts in Corona, Queens.
Rescuing Tibbetts Brook
A multi-artist initiative to raise public awareness and support for the daylighting of Tibbetts Brook in the Northwest Bronx, using art installations, workshops, and community engagement to inform the design of a new linear park.
The Buried Brook
An augmented reality sound walk by Kamala Sankaram that traces the historical and ecological journey of Tibbetts Brook through community-sourced audio and interactive mobile technology.
Tibbetts Estuary Tapestry
A community embroidery project led by Ana De La Cueva and Matthew López-Jensen, inviting residents to envision green infrastructure interventions in the Northwest Bronx through textile art.
WaterWays // Cloudbursts
A city-wide initiative engaging communities in New York City, starting in Corona, Queens, to address flooding from intense rain events through artist-led walks, workshops, and collaborations with DEP and local organizations.
activities · 4 groups
What they do
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Community-Engaged Public Art Projects 6 activities
- Conducts community workshops on local environmental challengesFacilitates participatory workshops with 30–40 participants—including artists, scientists, students, and residents—to identify socio-environmental challenges and develop arts-based strategies. Workshops have been held in Chinatown, West Harlem, Van Cortlandt Park, Marble Hill, and Washington D.C., addressing flooding, air quality, food access, and cultural heritage.
- Develops and commissions community-engaged environmental art projectsCommissions artist-led proposals based on workshop findings and implements resulting community environmental projects, ranging from small interventions to large-scale urban initiatives. Projects are developed in collaboration with cities, institutions, and local stakeholders using the CALL framework.
- Expands public engagement through CALL/WALKS national program and toolkitLaunched a national CALL/WALKS program with events at Yale University and in Washington D.C., and produced a toolkit to support implementation of artist- and scientist-led public walks by partner institutions and communities.
- Implements CALL/CHINATOWN projects addressing environmental and cultural issuesDevelops and facilitates artist-led projects in Manhattan’s Chinatown that address environmental challenges such as food systems, traditional Chinese medicine, heat loss in historic housing, and public space use—while honoring cultural heritage. Includes bilingual mapping, storytelling, and public installations informed by community input.
- Implements WaterMarks initiative in MilwaukeeDevelops and implements WaterMarks, a long-term, dispersed network of community-engaged projects in Milwaukee that help citizens understand their relationship to urban water systems and infrastructure. The initiative includes workshops, marker installations, and collaborative planning with residents.
- Organizes community walks pairing artists and scientistsConducts artist- and scientist-led public walks in urban communities to explore environmental and social concerns, integrating informal learning, grassroots activism, artistic vision, and scientific knowledge. These walks are part of citywide programs in New York City, Milwaukee, and Washington D.C., focusing on issues like flooding, water systems, and green infrastructure.
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General Operating Support Grants 1 activity
- Funds operations through major philanthropic contributionsFunds organizational operations primarily through a major contribution from Agnes Gund, enabling ongoing programming and project implementation.
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Arts and Cultural Workforce Training 1 activity
- Offers internships in interdisciplinary and artist-led sustainability practicesProvides internships focused on interdisciplinary practices and artist-led partnerships aimed at advancing sustainability, offering hands-on experience in community-engaged art and environmental projects.
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Uncategorized 4 activities
- Conducts research on socially and environmentally engaged art practicesCommissioned a social ecologist from Yale University to conduct qualitative research exploring the practice of City as Living Laboratory (CALL) and the broader field of socially and environmentally minded contemporary art.
- Launches BROADWAY: 1000 Steps as a green corridor demonstration projectInitiated BROADWAY: 1000 Steps in 2013 as a foundational project reimagining Broadway as a “Green Corridor” through twenty street-level hubs featuring interactive installations that reveal urban sustainability systems. Included temporary public art hubs with walkable maps, diagrams, and audio recordings to engage the public with infrastructure topics.
- Leads Rescuing Tibbetts Brook advocacy and engagement projectDirects a multi-faceted initiative in the Northwest Bronx to advocate for daylighting the buried Tibbetts Brook into the Harlem River via an abandoned railroad line, creating a linear park and green corridor. Activities include public art installations, augmented reality sound walks, body-painting events, communal embroidery, student collaborations, and community gatherings to advance ecological restoration and public awareness.
- Provides consulting services for community environmental engagementOffers consulting services to cities and organizations on using the CALL/WALKS model to foster community environmental engagement through interdisciplinary collaboration between artists, scientists, and residents.
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financials · form 990 · fy2024
revenue
Total revenue$1.04M
Contributions & grants$1.00M96%
Program service revenue$40K4%
Investment income$2K0%
Other revenue$0
expenses
Total expenses$930K
Program expenses79%
Admin / overhead8%
Fundraising13%
Salaries & benefits$393K
Grants paid out$0
Largest expense lineCompensation
balance sheet
Total assets$332K
Cash$170K
Investments$7K
Liabilities$70K
Net assets$261K
Liquid reserves2.3 mo
6 years on record · 2019–2024 · YoY revenue +45.3%
leadership · form 990 part vii · fy2024
Who runs it
paid leadership · 2
| Name | Title | Hours/wk | Compensation |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mary Miss | Artistic Director | 40 | $91K |
| Olivia Georgia | Executive Director | 40 | $69K |
board members · 14
- Buck Moorhead — Director
- Charles McKinney — Director
- John Woldenberg — Director
- Julia Taylor — Treasurer
- Marlon Blackwell — Director
- Paul Means — Director
- Ray Gastil — Director
- Sabine Marx — Director
- Steward Pickett — Director
- Susanna Church — President
- Tasmin Dillon — Director
- Walter Hood — Director
- William S Ryall — Director
- Zachary Youngerman — Secretary
relationships · 49
Who they work with
- AIDS Healthcare Foundation Partner — Institutional affiliation of a walk leader involved in the event.
- Agnes Gund Funder — Primary funder whose contribution supports the operations of City as Living Laboratory.
- Anacostia Parks & Community Collaborative (APACC) Partner — Community collaborative involved in the Head Above the Water event.
- Bronx Council for Environmental Quality Partner — Key partner in the Coalition for Daylighting Tibbetts Brook and co-founder of the initiative with CALL.
- Cary Michael Robinson Partner — Collaborated with City as Living Laboratory on a community engagement event along Watts Branch and Oxon Run streams in Washington, D.C.
- City College Academy for Professional Preparation (CCAPP) Division of Science Partner — Provided faculty and student assistance in developing content and public programs for the installation
- City College Department of Urban Design Partner — Academic partner collaborating on the Broadway and 137th Street hub
- Community Board Nine Partner — Community partner engaged in the development of the Broadway and 137th Street hub
- DC Department of Energy and the Environment Government — Supported the Head Above the Water event in Anacostia.
- FEMA Government — Supported the Head Above the Water event in Anacostia.
- Friends of Oxon Run Park Partner — Community organization involved in organizing and leading the Head Above the Water event.
- George Mason University Partner — Institutional affiliation of a walk leader and sustainability expert involved in the event.
- Guardians of Flushing Bay Partner — Partner organization in the WaterWays initiative, collaborating on community advocacy and ecological restoration.
- Haggerty Museum Partner — Local partner in a 2018 workshop with Acosta Middle School students to select the letter for the first WaterMarks WaterMarker.
- Hall of Science Partner — Partner organization in the WaterWays initiative, supporting science-based public engagement on cloudburst impacts.
- Institute for Urban Design Partner — Collaborated on the implementation of the Broadway and 137th Street hub during Urban Design Week 2010
- KKRNIA Partner — Collaborated with CALL on a workshop where residents selected the letter for the second WaterMarks Marker.
- MMSD Partner — Collaborated with CALL on a workshop where residents selected the letter for the second WaterMarks Marker.
- Mailman School of Public Health Partner — Partnered with CALL on a 2015 workshop in West Harlem to explore neighborhood environmental concerns.
- Manhattan College Partner — Academic partner whose civil and environmental engineering faculty participated in educational programming for the Visions of Tibbetts Brook project.
- Montefiore Park Neighborhood Association Partner — Community partner involved in developing content and public programs for the Broadway and 137th Street hub
- Myles Zhang Partner — Collaborated with CALL on the "Pedestrian Observations" project mapping public space use in Chinatown.
- NYC Department of Environmental Protection Partner — Collaborated to engage vulnerable communities in public awareness activities related to urban cloudburst flooding.
- National Endowment for the Arts Funder — Provided support for CALL’s framework development, including a workshop in Washington DC and the national CALL/WALKS program.
- National Science Foundation Government — Funded the 137th Street hub through an Early-concept Grant for Exploratory Research (EAGER) award for Informal Science Education
- New York Botanical Garden Partner — Supports CALL and NYC DEP in developing community programs on water, infrastructure, and resiliency in Corona, Queens.
- New York City Department of Environmental Protection Partner — Collaborates with CALL on the WaterWays initiative to implement cloudburst infrastructure and community engagement in Corona, Queens.
- Nicole Salimbene Partner — Collaborated with City as Living Laboratory on a community engagement event along Watts Branch and Oxon Run streams in Washington, D.C.
- Outer Seed Shadow Partner — Organization founded by Juanli Carrion, involved in the Rescuing Tibbetts Brook collaboration.
- Provisions Research Center for Arts and Social Change at George Mason University Partner — Partnered with CALL on a convening in Washington D.C. to discuss sustainable development through art, science, and community collaboration.
+ 19 more
strategies · 5
How they approach the work
Named approaches extracted from this org’s sources. Where others share an approach, follow it to see the full set of orgs running it.
- Artist-Led Interdisciplinary Collaborationmethodology: artist-led_interdisciplinary_collaborationBy integrating artists with scientists, planners, and policymakers in public-facing projects, the organization makes complex urban sustainability issues tangible and accessible to communities, because artistic framing fosters experiential understanding that technical data alone cannot achieve.
- Catalytic Art Interventionsmethodology: catalytic_embeddingBy embedding small-scale, attention-grabbing art installations into urban infrastructure, the organization sparks curiosity and initiates organic expansion of community-led action, because visible, interactive cues serve as entry points for public inquiry and long-term engagement.
- Community-Driven Co-Creationmethodology: iterative-community-co-creationBy using iterative, community-informed processes—from walks to workshops to proposals—projects are co-developed with residents, because involving communities as active design partners ensures relevance, ownership, and sustained engagement in environmental solutions.
- Indigenous-Led Environmental Justicemethodology: Indigenous-led environmental justiceBy centering Indigenous leadership in environmental protection efforts, the organization advances justice and sustainability, because meaningful recognition of rights requires shifting power—not just symbolic acknowledgment—enabling stewardship rooted in traditional knowledge and long-term relationship to land.
- Place-Based Experiential Engagementmethodology: place-based_artistic_engagementBy anchoring programs in specific locations through artistic interventions, storytelling, and guided inquiry, the organization deepens public connection to local environmental issues, because personal and sensory experiences of place stimulate awareness, emotional resonance, and action more effectively than abstract information.