A Welcome Increase in the 2016 Budget for San Diego’s Commission for Arts & Culture
Article by Anna Robert
On May 6, 2015 the San Diego City Council had a budget hearing on the state of Arts and Culture in San Diego. For people who are somehow involved or support this significant part of San Diego’s cultural life, this review with Councilmember Todd Gloria and Council President Sherri Lightner was an exciting moment that uncovered new opportunities for development and prosperity of the City’s cultural institutions and campaigns.
Annually, the Mayor proposes a total budget for the Commission for Arts and Culture and this year Mayor Kevin Faulconer proposed to increase the total budget by 8%, from $10,040,703 in 2015 to $10,912,169 in 2016.
The Commission was established back in 1988 to advise the Mayor and City Council on encouraging and increasing support for San Diego’s artistic and cultural assets and showcasing the City as an international tourist destination.
In the plan for the year 2016, 70% of the proposed budget is designated for funding non-profit arts and culture organizations and almost 10% will be provided for specific projects – for example, neighborhood festivals, parades, and fairs.
While the majority of long-time recipients of this funding will be given reasonable increases, there are twenty-two first-time applicants who also received awards. Among them are such organizations as San Diego Musical Theatre, New Americans Museum, San Diego Hall of Champions and such projects as San Diego Arab Film Festival, Spoken Word and Graffiti Art Festival, and Tijuana Burlesque – World Premiere.
Vibrant Culture, Vibrant City badges distinguished those who came to show their support, including Deborah Klochko, the Executive Director of the Museum of Photographic Arts; Micah Parzen, the CEO of the Museum of Man; and many others. Larry Baza, the Chair of the Commission for Arts & Culture – composed of 15 volunteers appointed by the Mayor, took a word to provide his insight into the proposed budget plan and its significance.
His colleagues stepped forward to prove the necessity of the budget increase and pointed out at the fact that in the end, it will be beneficial for the City’s revenues if San Diego becomes a notable cultural destination – according to the data, the cultural tourist tends to spend twice as much as an average one. Another advantage of arts and culture funding is directly related to the number of jobs, according to one of the Commissioners. At this moment San Diego offers 23,250 arts-related jobs, which is 2.9% of all jobs in the city (data from Americans for the Arts, Creative Industries Report, January 2015). Right now, this is not sufficient and as a result, the City loses valuable specialists in the field of arts and culture, because most of university graduates searching for jobs in arts have to move out from San Diego and look for them in other cities.
The Commission strongly believes that constant annual increase in the budget will provide stability of non-profit organizations and will help them to grow and offer more jobs.
