Pathetic. There is no other way to describe the current state of
public support for the arts in California.
The California Arts Council has had its budget slashed from $31
million in 2000 to $26 million in 2001 to $18 million in 2002 to $1
million this year. To better understand how low public support has
sunk, consider that Canadians spend an annual $145 per capita to
fund the arts; Germans, $85; New Yorkers, $2.75; Mississippians,
$1.31; Californians, 3 cents.
Pathetic. There is no other way to describe the current state of public support for the arts in California.
The California Arts Council has had its budget slashed from $31 million in 2000 to $26 million in 2001 to $18 million in 2002 to $1 million this year. To better understand how low public support has sunk, consider that Canadians spend an annual $145 per capita to fund the arts; Germans, $85; New Yorkers, $2.75; Mississippians, $1.31; Californians, 3 cents.
“That’s gum balls,” says Barry Hessenius, director of the council. Three gum balls a year.
Yes, California is in the middle of an epic budget crisis. The arts were seen by many legislators and former Gov. Gray Davis as expendable. But in truth, they are an integral part of California’s economic engine, drawing hundreds of millions in tourism dollars and spurring related spending on restaurants, hotels and transportation. Creativity is what drives a number of lucrative industries that make this state hum, from film and video game production to clothing and software design.
The arts in California are in the middle of their own crisis right now. All five traditional funding sources are down: Government funding (federal, state and local); foundation support; corporate philanthropy; individual giving; and ticket sales.
Efforts are afoot in the Legislature to restore Arts Council funding to $7.5 million in next year’s budget, perhaps by placing a small surcharge on movie tickets. With 195 million movie tickets sold in California annually, that surcharge would cost just pennies per sale. It’s still just gum balls.
Why not be a little more ambitious for a cause that feeds not just the state’s economy, but also its soul? Why not go for a quarter per ticket, which would raise nearly $49 million annually? Why not 50 cents? Such surcharges, as long as they are related to the cause for which they raise funds, can be enacted by a simple majority of the Legislature with the governor’s signature.
And who better to think broadly and strategically about the role of the arts in the California economy than Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, whose own fortune was made by a Hollywood film industry that depends on creativity for almost every aspect of its success? The governor’s challenge ought not to be simply restoring the Arts Council to its former modesty, but putting the arts on a platform equivalent in size and emphasis to their integral place in the state’s economy. It’s time to think bigger.
