More than a dozen nonprofit organizations were named recipients of Allie Cat community grants Tuesday as organizers announced nearly $112,250 was raised from this spring’s Allie Cat Run & Festival.

Held on a cold, damp day back in March, Leslie Carruth, who founded the festival along with her husband, Bill Carruth, in honor of their daughter, Alexandra “Allie” Garnett Carruth, said she was a little nervous this year’s event wouldn’t raise as much as in previous years.

“I was really nervous this year because with the economy, and everybody we spoke to was like, ‘We can’t do as much as we have done in the past,’” she told those gathered for Tuesday’s reception at the Meridian Museum of Art to present the community grants.

On top of that, rain and cooler temperatures, as well as a busy weekend of events, slightly hurt runner turnout and festival attendance.

Despite the obstacles, the run and festival generated its most donations to date, Carruth said, giving credit to daughter Allie for teaming up with God “to show out a little bit.”

“This is the most that we’ve made so far,” Carruth said as husband Bill and son William Carruth uncovered an oversized poster check revealing the total raised from the festival as $112,249.93.

“That’s an insane amount considering that I don’t even know where it came from,” she said with a laugh.

This year marked the seventh year for the Allie Cat Run & Festival, which started in spring 2018 a year after Allie, age 6 at the time, died following a tragic accident.

To help cope with their grief and loss, the Carruths decided to hold an event to honor Allie’s spirit, contribute to meaningful causes in the community and promote eye, tissue and organ donation since Allie was an organ donor.

“We’ve raised over $500,000,” Carruth said since the first festival, “and we give it away because our community was so supportive of us that that’s what we felt like we needed to do is give back.”

The Mississippi Organ Recovery Association, the organization the Carruths initially sought to raise donations for from the festival, was the largest beneficiary from the grants with the Carruths presenting MORA officials with a $25,000 check during the reception.

Another $20,000 grant was presented to Meridian Community College’s School of Nursing, where Bill Carruth was a first-year student in spring 2017.

“We are forever grateful for the staff and the people and his teachers and his counselors because they were like, ‘Hey, we’ve got you. It’s fine. We’re going to get you through this,’” she said of the family’s attempts to reciprocate that kindness and support through the Allie Cat Foundation.

Timia Graham, a senior at Meridian High School, was presented with this year’s Allie Cat Scholarship. Graham plans to pursue her education at Mississippi State University.

Other recipients of Allie Cat community grants, which are administered by the Community Foundation of East Mississippi, were Care Lodge Domestic Violence Shelter; EmpowerKids Foundation; Illuminations Center for Dyslexia; Lauderdale Baptist Crisis Center; Go Green Meridian; Meridian Museum of Art; Hope Village for Children; Merrehope through the Meridian Restorations Foundation Inc.; Ochsner Rush Foundation for Project Inspire; The SPOT, or Special Place for Others to Thrive & Family Resource for Kids; Roadside Rescue; Meridian Symphony Association; Lauderdale County Animal Shelter; and Ava and Cooper’s Journey Through Autism.

In addition to presenting this year’s grant recipients, the Carruths also announced they are stepping back from the festival for the next year. Son William, a recent Lamar School graduate, is headed off to his freshman year of college at Mississippi State University, and the family wants to be available to enjoy visits to Starkville. Also, while she will no longer be teaching art at Lamar, Leslie Carruth stays very busy as a member of the local art murals group, Meridian Museum Art Collective.

“Allie would have been 13 this year … so this year the Carruth family is taking a little break and we are going to get William settled into Mississippi State, and I’m entering a new chapter,” she said. “We are going to take a year and just kind of let our family heal and heal properly and heal without William because there are a lot of feelings going on right there.”

Carruth said they invited other families to help with this year’s festival to show them the ropes and to see if they would be open to carrying on the Allie Cat festival.

“We brought them in at the beginning of Allie Cat this year, and have encouraged them and told them to take the torch and run with it,” she said.

“We are going to see how this year goes,” she added. “We’re grateful for all of our sponsors and for all of you who have supported us and for all of our amazing volunteers, really everybody that has loved us because Allie Cat can’t happen without that support.”