Executive Committee Votes to Protect Arts Grants

Yesterday at City Hall, the Executive Committee of City of Toronto voted not to cut the 2012 arts grants budget.

City of Toronto Committee Meeting; image courtesy of Dewi Minden

The motion, put forward by Councillor Peter Milczyn, states “that City Council reverse the reduction to the CPIP Budget Envelope of $1.9 million for Arts and Culture Grants, the funds to be drawn from additional assessment growth revenues.” City Council is expected to approve this motion at its special budget meeting beginning on January 17.

The decision by Executive to protect arts funding from impending cuts was arrived at in response to thousands of Toronto residents voicing their opposition to the cuts. Councillors Michael Thompson, Jaye Robinson, Peter Milczyn and Gary Crawford worked very hard within the Ford administration to defend the importance of arts funding. Councillors Anna Bailão, Shelley Carroll, John Filion, and Mary Fragedakis, who join Gary Crawford as City appointed Directors of the Board of Toronto Arts Council (TAC), also provided critical behind-the-scenes support. Councillor Mike Layton offered very strong community leadership with his support of the Friends of the Arts Network. The network now includes over 20,000 Toronto residents, many of whom have contacted their local Councillors to defend the importance of arts funding. Claire Hopkinson, Executive Director of Toronto Arts Council, said “In addition to the support of so many Councillors who championed this move to protect the arts, I am grateful for the efficient work accomplished by the Mayors Arts Task Force in such a short time. Equally important was the strategic groundwork laid by Culture Division in developing the Creative Capital Gains Report and in helping to launch the Municipal Cultural Investment in Five Large Canadian Cities Report. The research provided by these publications reveals and clarifies the critical role the arts play in the economic fabric of the city.”

“I was encouraged by Councillor Milczyn’s remarks,” said Toronto Arts Foundation Chair, Susan Crocker. “He made clear that this administration now considers itself a strong supporter of the arts and is willing to defend the value of arts grants despite significant cuts elsewhere.”

The City Budget for 2012 with the amendments made on January 12 will be put forward for a final vote by City Council on January 17^th.

To learn more about recent arts advocacy efforts, please visit http://www.torontoartsfoundation.org/Our-Programs/Advocacy

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Dewi Minden, Toronto Arts Council

How Can We Advocate For Community-Engaged Artists?

On October 14, three panelists, Robin Pacific, Artist and Co-Founder of Art Starts, Andrew Suri, Community Arts Officer at the Toronto Arts Council, and Nadira Pattison, Arts Services Manager at the City of Toronto Cultural Services, shared their perspectives on arts advocacy at the Buddies in Bad Times Theatre.

The turnout was great on a cold, rainy day, and individual artists and members of organizations such as Arts for Children and Youth, Scarborough Arts Council, Ontario Arts Council, MABELLEarts, & Jumblies Theatre came together to discuss  how we might defend, maintain, support, and promote community-engaged artists in Toronto.

The conversation started with the panelists sharing their proudest arts advocacy moments:

Nadira Pattison’s work with an external advisory body enabled her to pinpoint four major service gaps:  space, funding, profile of the sector and resource-sharing. This advisory body developed 14 recommendations that were adopted by City Council as the Community Arts Action Plan. Nadira says, “We underestimate the value of telling our elected officials the wonderful things that have happened.”

Robin Pacific, co-founder of Art Starts, a storefront community arts centre that uses the arts to help build healthy communities, says that we need to ‘speak to people’s higher natures’ when advocating for community arts.

Andrew believes that the work has to be effectual. Community art is still relatively new, and has the potential to change the lives of the people working with it. “As the practice deepens, I would like to see more rigorous community arts happen without losing that grassroots quality.”

There was a question and answer session that ranged from topics such as bringing community arts to rural communities in Ontario, advocating to city counselors, politics of the field, and individual art-making versus community arts. Cheers to good sushi and networking for Neighbourhood Arts Network members!

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The Federation of Arts Councils and Cultural Agencies has put together a toolkit that has practical tips and strategies for arts advocates. To download the PDF version for free, click here.

Remember to vote for the upcoming election on October 25!  Arts Vote has released their candidates’ Arts Report Card.

The next Neighbourhood Arts Network event will be on November 18, 2010. Presented by NAN and City of Toronto Arts Services, the topic is ‘Building a Movement for Social Change’ with Che Kothari, Executive Director of Manifesto.

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Aasana Sri is the Fall 2010  Communications Intern with the Toronto Arts Foundation

Making SPACE: Evolution of Advocacy Networks

Advocacy is the process of supporting an idea or cause to influence outcomes such as public policy, or the distribution of local resources and information. Within community arts, the issue of the space in which we engage and work with communities is an idea that many organizations feel strongly about, but do not advocate directly upon. While it is important for groups to work towards individual goals, there are also organizations that work on behalf of common issues in the larger not-for-profit community.

“Losing space is kind of like losing oxygen for community development.”

“Losing space is kind of like losing oxygen for community development.”
This was the poignant statement recently made by Ann Fitzpatrick to a room full of social work, nursing, adult education, planning, and public health students at the University of Toronto. I was part of this audience and had the opportunity to listen to Fitzpatrick enthusiastically discuss advocacy in community development and the Saving Public Access to Community Space Everywhere (SPACE) Coalition.

If you have ever been on the administrative end of a non-profit community based arts group then you are likely well aware of the many challenges involved in securing a space. While there are many good/adequate venues to host programming, obstacles to secure space include cost, locked doors, permits, storage of equipment, and location. Working collaboratively with Social Planning Toronto (SPT), and other social planning councils across the province, SPACE advocates and provides resources for community groups to reduce barriers, help lower rental fees, create comprehensive lists of availabilities, and as a result enhance capacity to sustain programming. The SPACE website also has many resources such as information on how to access locations through the school boards.

In her talk, Fitzpatrick explained that advocacy is made possible through coalitions and networks that often come together informally through 2-3 people working towards a goal that they believe needs change. This network/organization/coalition requires a core group of dedicated people who can address a few simple and very important questions.

1)      What do we want to accomplish?
2)      What will we learn by being part of this group?
3)      How will we take this information back to our community?

With passion, Fitzpatrick described how exciting it is to be near the tipping point of a local issue and part of the group pushing reform. While some may feel advocacy is time consuming, groups can collectively push agendas further by people coming together rather than spending time individually.

While some may feel advocacy is time consuming, groups can collectively push agendas further by people coming together rather than spending time individually.

In her discussion of community development, Fitzpatrick had a few simple suggestions on how to increase capacity within individual organizations. She suggested the importance of establishing a local presence, and making goals known within the community. Simple and affordable tasks like distributing pamphlets, attending speaking engagements and neighbourhood events, and forming alliances also work to build energy and enthusiasm.

While acknowledging the often time consuming process, Fitzpatrick spoke of the necessity of having people involved on the front-line, working and living in communities to shape solutions on local issues. To make change, and keep the oxygen flowing, community organizations must work together, engage locally, and gain first hand knowledge on what is needed to shape municipal policy.

To find out more about the SPACE Coalition visit www.spacecoalition.ca

To find out more about Social Planning Toronto visit http://socialplanningtoronto.org

To learn more about the community use of schools visit

http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/general/elemsec/community/

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Robyn Shyllit is a graduate of the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, and a student in the Cities Centre Community Development Program at the University of Toronto completing a Masters degree in Planning.