Who says there’s no money in art?

The city of Issaquah will be doling out more than $160,000 in grants in 2015, divvied among 30 projects selected by the Arts Commission.

That amount exceeds the city’s 2015 budget of $130,000 for arts grants. But the shortfall will be made up with money from the Municipal Art Fund, which ended 2014 with a hefty $300,000 balance.

The grants were approved by consent of the city council Feb. 17.

In all, 18 non-government organizations and eight schools and associate institutions within the Issaquah School District applied for grants totaling $220,715 for 32 projects.

Those projects include events like Issaquah Parks and Recreation’s Concerts on the Green and the Chamber of Commerce’s Salmon Days Festival, educational programs like artEAST’s youth programming and parks and rec’s Teen Art Club, as well as support for ongoing programming like Village Theatre shows and Eastside Writes’ Talking Pages reading series.

More than half of the applications  received a lesser endowment than requested. ArtEAST, for example, received about two-thirds of funding requested for three grants.

All school applications received full funding for grants funding art docent programs, installations, and performing and fine arts events. School organizations applying for grants were the Apollo Elementary PTA, Beaver Lake Middle School, Challenger Elementary, Clark Elementary, Echo Glen Children’s Center, Issaquah High School, Issaquah Middle School and Tiger Mountain Community High School.