Three Rivers School District sells Huss Elementary to a private buyer.
After a crowdfunding campaign that raises $40,000 in 40 days, the nonprofit organization *culture is not optional purchases the historic Huss Elementary school from a private owner.
In partnership with Calvin College, *cino hosts a group of college students for a weeklong service-learning experience at the Huss Project. It is the first of many service-learning groups we’ve hosted—college students, summer campers, church groups, and more.
In partnership with local volunteers, a community garden is planted in the back yard at Huss. Over the years, this grows in the Huss Project Urban Farm.
Our first Future Festival! The Festival was an annual celebration of creativity in our city that ran for 10 years. It was an attempt to live in to the future we hoped for at the Huss Project—a future that has, in many ways, become a reality!
Another crowdfunding campaign pays off our mortgage.
The community garden becomes a one-acre diversified urban vegetable farm.
*cino raises $250,000 to begin renovation on the Imaginarium and construction on the Front Porch Pavilion on the north end of the building.
*cino renovates the first part of the building into the Imaginarium, which becomes the only fully functional space in the building since 2007. Using reclaimed barn timbers from the historic Gleason Farm, the Front Porch Pavilion is constructed on the north end of the building.
*cino purchases the house and a vacant lot to the south of the Huss Project. The Caretaker’s House provides housing for volunteers who oversee daily activities and maintenance at the Huss Project.
After the City of Three Rivers cancelled the city’s farmer’s market during COVID, Huss starts a weekly Farmer’s Market in the Front Porch Pavilion.
*cino community members purchase an additional 19 acres adjacent to Huss and *cino leases another 20 acres from a railroad company to increase the size of the Huss Campus to 45 acres. Plans are still underway for how this additional land will be utilized!
