Senator James Jeffords

It is impossible NOT to join the chorus of so many others in celebrating the life and career of Senator Jim Jeffords. He was a thoughtful leader in so many areas – disability rights, education, the environment, and, of course, the arts. He was the co-founder of the Congressional Arts Caucus, the Senate Cultural Caucus, and the Congressional High School Art Competition. He fought tirelessly to retain funding for the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities. Senator Jeffords’s efforts in support of the arts led to his becoming the first recipient of the Americans for Arts and the United States Conference of Mayors joint inaugural award for Congressional Arts Leadership in 1997.

Senator Jeffords touched Vermonters and Americans in myriad ways. For me, a highlight was in May, 1999. I was invited to testify on behalf of the reauthorization of the National Endowment for the Arts in front of the Senate Health Education Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee. There was much articulate, thoughtful, and passionate testimony that day, but the “main event” that afternoon turned out to be Jacques D’Amboise, a former principal dancer with the New York City Ballet and the founder of the National Dance Institute.

I will never forget him sitting in front of the committee, asking them to imagine a group of early hominids lying under the stars and seeing, perhaps for the first time, a shooting star. “What would their reaction be?” D’Amboise wondered. “An ooh, then maybe an aah, and spontaneous clapping?”

As D’Amboise continued his story he became more and more animated, oohing and aahing and clapping and exhorting everyone in the hearing to do the same. Within a minute he was on his feet and creating a dance from just the rhythm and sounds of his voice, his hands, and his stomping feet.

It was suddenly a very lively HELP hearing. Decorum prohibited the committee members from joining D’Amboise’s impromptu performance, but I will never forget the smile on the face of the committee chair.

Senator James Jeffords was beaming.

From his expression, I could tell Senator Jeffords felt that THIS testimony showed the Senate at its best: helping people to understand the importance of dancing, singing, and finding joy in life. For years after this testimony, I remember thinking how well D’Amboise delivered his message. Now I have come to understand that the more profound message was delivered by the Senator himself, and he hardly said a thing.

Rest in Peace, Senator, and thank you. Each time a shooting star streaks across the night sky, I will remember your smile that day and think of you oohing and aahing and stomping your feet and clapping your hands.

The First Big Thank You (The Big Ask, Part 4)

A couple of days ago the Vermont House Appropriations Committee voted the Appropriations bill out of committee, and the Arts Council was recommended for an increase of $100,000 to $607,607.

While some reading this post might be tempted to be upset or disillusioned by this reduction to the Governor's recommended increase, the truth is that was the second act of a four-act drama that comprises the 2013 legislative season—at the end of which we hope to end up with an increase of $210,000, not $100,000.  So for now, my message to all of you supporting our efforts to increase support for the arts in Vermont is a very huge and heartfelt “Thank You!”

Arguing on behalf of the arts when so many important programs are seeing large reductions is difficult in the best of circumstances.  That we all have, thus far, convinced the Governor and the House that an increase is necessary (the question is now not “whether?” but “how much?”), is an incredibly important hurdle to have overcome in what is being reported as the most contentious budget battle in recent memory.

There are two more acts before this year's show is over.  Attention first turns to the Senate Appropriations Committee who needs to hear from you that you support the Governor’s recommendation of $210,000 before it votes out its own version of the Appropriations bill in a few weeks’ time.  Of vital importance is to communicate to this body of key legislators that, as it stands now, the House's recommendation will not even allow us to draw down the Federal funds that we have coming to us.

Every Senator on the committee represents dozens, if not hundreds of artists, and several, if not dozens of arts organizations.  They also represent teachers, entrepreneurs, planners, designers, and a host of others whose lives and communities are significantly impacted every day by the arts.  Drop them each a note (remember to cc zeastes@vermontartscouncil.org) sharing your hopes that they will support the Governor’s recommendation.

The final act, during which we will have a final chance to sway the Legislature's decision on our appropriation, is during the conference committee when three House and three Senate members duke it out.  But let’s cross that bridge in a month.

For now, let’s take a breath, remind ourselves--again!--that the House’s recommendation will not allow us to draw down the full amount of Federal funds that we expect to have coming to us, and  turn our attention to the Vermont Senate.On to Act III...

(break a leg!)

CHOOSE ART (The Big Ask, Part 3)

Several months ago I outlined the case for the Vermont Arts Council’s request for a 100% increase from the State appropriations process in two posts: The Big Ask, and The Big Ask, Part 2.

It gives me great pleasure to report that last week Governor Peter Shumlin released his 2014 budget with a significant increase to the Arts Council’s budget:  $210,000, or 41%.  In addition, the Governor recommended increasing the Vermont Humanities Council‘s budget by $45,289 (or 26%), the Vermont Symphony Orchestra’s by $27,393 (or 24%), and the Vermont Historical Society’s by $74,525 (or 9%).

Without belaboring the point that this increase will almost certainly enable us to avoid leaving Federal funds on the table, this makes Governor Shumlin by far the most arts and culture-friendly Governor since Phil Hoff, and the thanks for this significant step forward is due to all of you who phoned, wrote, or in countless other ways let Governor Shumlin know that standing up for the arts at a time of economic uncertainty is good for business, good for communities, good for schools, good for tourism, and, in general good for Vermont.  So, good for all of YOU who made this case to the Governor, and Thank You!

So now the hard part begins…

Regardless of your political affiliation, the Legislature has very hard choices to make this year. For example, should it fund low-income heating assistance or fund weatherization? Fund programs that help incarcerated individuals transition out of prisons, or fund programs that help prevent young men and women from going to prison in the first place? Fund more arts education, or fund more free and reduced lunch programs in schools?

Where public funding is concerned there is always going to be disagreement among well-informed, well-intentioned leaders.  To me, however, this is really not an “either/or” but a “both/and” conversation.  Every one of the choices listed above are good.  We need BOTH heating assistance AND weatherization.  We need programs BOTH for incarcerated individuals AND for those who are at-risk.  We need BOTH reduced lunch programs AND the arts in order for our students and our communities to prosper.

But let us not lose sight of several important pieces of information that are frequently overlooked by policy-makers.

Where the arts thrive, so thrives the school—attracting young parents to the community, and providing a broad range of activities (beyond academics and athletics) to engage young minds

Where the arts thrive, so thrives local business and entrepreneurship—attracting and retaining businesses requires more than just a salary.  Businesses need art and culture and recreation in order to have healthy, productive, educated workers who are happy doing their work

Where the arts thrive, so thrives the economy—for every dollar of public (state and local) investment in the arts, Vermont and its municipalities receive more than $6.50 in tax receipts.  (Note: this is real impact, not an expression of economic activity.  There’s a huge difference)

Where the arts thrive, so thrives the community—communities that pay attention to the “look and feel” of their downtowns, to what happens to their graduating seniors, to the quality of life that their senior citizens enjoy attract more civic-minded and creative people to serve on school- and select-boards, planning commissions and other community-oriented bodies

This year, for the first time in a generation, Vermont’s Governor has asked the Legislature to increase the support for art and culture state wide.  Now it is your turn.  Please ask YOUR legislators to support the Governor’s recommendations. 

Ask them to choose art.

The Big Ask, Part 2

A few weeks ago, I informed you that circumstances in Washington were unfolding in a way that necessitated an increase next year in the Vermont Arts Council’s state appropriation.  Having attended two national arts conferences since then, I want to provide some clarity to this situation, as it has many moving parts.

Our best estimate at this time is that, due to the “Sequestration” following last year’s Debt Ceiling compromise and the uncertainty over the budget negotiations for FY2014, the National Endowment for the Arts’ (NEA) Federal grant to the Council will be almost 10% less (reducing it to about $655,000) next year than it is this year.

We, however, remain optimistic, that between now and May 2013, White House and Congressional negotiations will minimize or even eliminate that reduction.

Therefore, without boring everyone to tears with complex arithmetic related to calculating how the State will meet the one-to-one match required by the NEA, which is sure to change in any case, our “minimum” requested increase from the State for next year is actually a range: from $175,000 to $250,000.  Being clever people, we suggested that people focus on the upper end of the range when talking with their legislators or the Governor.  (Bear in mind that the actual increase we have requested is $500,000 of which the $250,000 will allow us to avoid “leaving Federal money on the table.”)

All of this is meant to convey that the funding situation is complex, dependent on many moving parts of which most are pretty much dependent on what happens in Washington in the next couple of weeks.

Confused?  You are not alone.  We will give you more information as it develops.

For information about how YOU can help get this budget increase to pass, please read my previous blog entry.

On Assessment

“The Arts Council should do something fun, cheap, and available to any man, woman, and child that wants to participate.  I’m recommending we do a project with an artist’s palette; send them all over the state to any community that wants a bunch.  Let everyone decide for him or herself how they want to decorate their palette.  It’ll be fun, and it will do more to raise awareness about our work than anything else we could possibly do.”

“But will it work?  How are we going to know if it does everything you claim it will do?”

“Trust me, it will work.”

“How do you know?”

“I just do.  That’s how.”

[The above conversation took place between two Council trustees at our Annual Meeting in the summer of 2005.  The argument was regarding whether to undertake what became “The Palettes Project.”]

*     *     *     *     *

For the sixth time since arriving in Vermont I am working on the Arts Council’s Partnership Application to the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA).  It is, in the truest sense of the word, a labor of love. 

When else does one have the opportunity to cram what could easily amount to a 150-page discourse on programs and services offered to artists, arts organizations, schools, and communities  into a mere 11 pages?  When else do we in this very limited field (there are only about 60 state, territorial, and regional arts councils in the USA) get to brag to our peers about the incredible work that, in some small but meaningful way, we have helped bring into existence within the borders of our small state?

Writing these applications is joyful.  It gives me a “5-hour energy boost” that lasts for months. It makes me incredibly grateful for the outstanding staff that works with me at the Council.  Their labors and those of our constituents nurture Vermont’s creative workers; engage our children in positive, collaborative pursuits; identify and preserve our most precious cultural landscapes; and in countless other ways improve Vermont’s quality of life.

There is, however, one aspect of applying for a grant (not just from the NEA) that has always perplexed me.  It is the inevitable question about evaluation/measurement/assessment.

While it is important for any non-profit, public-benefit corporation to be able to articulate why its work is worthy of public support (including tax-deductible contributions from private citizens), the degree to which “accountability” has crept into our daily lives is a diversion from the real arguments in favor of supporting the arts.

As a result of the conversation recreated above, the Palettes Project was approved unanimously by the Council’s trustees, all of whom trusted the gut instinct of a very experienced trustee (and their own) over the “cost/benefit-” or “risk/reward-”based arguments that staff was asked to present. And yes, it accomplished everything the trustee expected and much, much more.

How many times are we asked, sometimes in multiple ways, how we will know that our programs and services are successful?  For many of the things we do, the answer is quite easy.  We ask for reports from grantees and people who have participated in our Breaking into Business Workshops, and they simply tell us how great (or not!) the program or service has been.

But for the bulk of the money we spend on creation grants, operating support grants to organizations, project grants and arts education grants, the answer is often far more difficult to articulate.  We get a lot of responses like, “the smiles on the faces of the kids as they left the auditorium, were priceless.”  And, oddly enough, I completely know what the grantee is telling me when I read a statement like that.

The truth is really that there are no metrics  to help us ascertain the degree to which a visit to the Flynn Center for the Performing Arts had an impact on the development of a 5^th-grader from Island Pond.  Nor is there a measurement tool that captures the unique causal relationship between the economic vigor of a community and the degree to which that community embraces its arts sector.  Perhaps some university-backed psychologist with a $500,000 grant to do a longitudinal study in these areas might reveal something concrete that most of us already know instinctively.  But to arrive at the positive conclusions about the impact of such activities on people’s and communities’ lives is something that ALL of us working in the arts know.  We have experienced it.  But getting concrete, incontrovertible, third-party evidence at a price we can all afford is, in my experience,a waste of money.

I have borne witness to literally hundreds of so-called “economic impact studies” (which, more often than not, are about activity not impact); served on dozens of panels that expound on the value of collaborations, of marketing, of professional development; participated , collaborated, and advocated for public and private arts support, using every argument in the book, from Cultural Heritage Tourism to the Creative Economy; and written literally a thousand blog pages urging people to value and support the arts.  But it all comes down to a series of simple statements.  Feel free to add your own:

We support the arts because they inspire us to lead a better life.

We support the arts because they reflect profoundly on the human condition.

We support the arts because they provide the emotional, subjective anchors that are at the root of community.

We support the arts because they engage our young people and allow our elders to share their wisdom.

We support the arts because they allow people from different backgrounds to gain respect for, and insight about, each other.

We support the arts because they allow us to work, to play, to rest, and to recover.  Homo sapiens have known this for 40,000 years or more.  We don’t need a longitudinal study of any kind to tell us this.

The bottom line is that I am completely satisfied that the programs and services we provide to Vermont’s arts sector and the programs and services the Vermont arts sector provides to the general public are neither more nor less exemplary than those provided by every other State Arts Council and their arts sectors.  We all have been doing this for a long time, and shall continue to as long as people can dance, speak, sing, hold a brush or camera, and write.   It’s important work, and it matters. How do I know?

I just do. That’s how.