Bill to boost state arts funding is put on hold until next year

It's "wait till next year" -- again -- for a bill in the state Legislature that would have provided a boost of about $30 million a year for the California Arts Council and raised the state's per-capita arts funding from last in the nation to the middle of the pack.

The bill, entitled the "Creative Industries and Community Economic Revitalization Act," was put on hold until 2010 on Thursday in the Assembly's Appropriations Committee. Two earlier bills to increase arts funding had died in committees since 2005. Numbered AB 700, this one calls for one-fifth of the state sales taxes collected from arts-related businesses such as art galleries, record shops and musical instrument stores to be reserved for the state arts council's grants to nonprofit arts organizations.

With California facing deficits of more than $20 billion and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger proposing cuts to healthcare, social services and education, backers of the arts funding bill took a page out of Shakespeare and decided that discretion would be the better part of valor on a day when the Appropriations Committee was killing many other spending bills.

Paul Krekorian (D-Burbank), the arts bill's sponsor, said he requested, and committee Chairman Kevin de Leon (D-Los Angeles) agreed, that the proposal be held over for a decision next year.

"It was clear that had the bill moved forward today, it would have been killed," Krekorian said. "We continue to live to fight another day.... You can't overstate how gruesome this budget crisis is right now."

Krekorian thinks his fellow legislators will buy the bill's main selling point: that money spent on the arts would lead to job creation and economic growth. That argument succeeded on the federal level this year when Congress approved $50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts as part of the huge economic stimulus package aimed at saving jobs. Whether the state is out of its deep fiscal tunnel next year -- or at least seeing the light at the tunnel's end -- will determine whether AB 700 has a chance of passing then, Krekorian said. The bill does not call for new taxes or spending, but it does earmark money for the arts that otherwise would go into general fund coffers whose use is flexible.

The California Taxpayers' Assn. opposes the bill and will continue to do so, spokesman David Kline said -- not because of antipathy for arts funding, but because it doesn't want more revenue tagged for a restricted, predetermined use. As the state tries to unravel its fiscal problems, he said, "it's especially important not to tie your hands for the future."

The question now may be whether arts advocates need to worry about hanging on to the $1.1 million a year the arts council currently receives from the general fund -- an amount needed to secure a matching $1 million from the NEA. Schwarzenegger already has called for slashing other state programs even though that would mean losing billions in matching federal money.

"The arts council already has experienced more than its share of cuts and we rank last in the country," Krekorian said, and cutting further makes no sense, "unless you want to make the decision that we should be out of the business of supporting the arts altogether. I hope not.... But we are in uncharted territory now."

In fact, the arts council, which early this decade had a budget of more than $30 million, already is pretty much a charity case: More than half of its $5.4-million budget comes from voluntary fees that arts-loving motorists pay for special vanity license plates whose proceeds are partly funneled to the arts council. The state spends 15 cents per capita on its arts agency, one-ninth  the national average of $1.35 calculated by the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies. 

-- Mike Boehm

Photos, from top: Arts-supporter license plate. Credit: California Arts Council. California Assembly member Paul Krekorian (facing camera). Credit: Robert Durrell / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[inafunk]

Actually, it's not 15 cents per capita -- it's six. Six cents per capita. I know it's hard to believe. And California is not only dead last among the 50 states in arts support -- it's dead last even when you count the territories. Yes, folks, Guam spends more per capita on the arts than California, the 6th largest economy in the world.

Shame on us.

[Sherry Stern]

From Sherry Stern at the Los Angeles Times: Actually, our figure is correct. Here's the math:. To get per capita funding, you divide the money ($5.4 million) by the population (NASAA used the July 2008 US Census figure of 36.6 million) and get 15 cents (rounded up from 14.75).

Looks like you did it the other way around, dividing the number of people by the dollar amount, which gives you 6.67.

[Rick Stein]

Look, the good news here is that there was a huge outpouring of support for AB700 from California citizens. State Assembly Members took note of that--and the fact that linking arts funding to the tax revenue directly generated by creative industries was a sensible approach.

Trying to get anything passed amidst the panicked hysteria of the state's budget crisis is suicidal, so tabling the effort for now is only prudent.

California Arts Advocates cites the per capita funding for the California Arts Council at 3 cents--which I believe is based upon the $1 million in general fund allocation, and not including the license plate money.

Thank you to everyone who contacted your Assembly Members and the Governor in support of AB700. We will need you again when it returns for consideration!

[Scratch]

Getting support for AB700 from dishonest, two-faced politicians like Mayor Villaraigosa and LA City Council does not serve this bill well. Anything they vote for, go the other way, because they're only after your pocketbook, revenues and not to be trusted. They could care less about "the arts."
Glad to see AB 700 put on hold.

[Lisa Caretto]

California Arts Council Funding
FY 2008-09
General Fund $1,115,000
Arts License Plate $3,172,000
National Endowment for the Arts $1,126,000

California Arts Council Proposed Funding
FY 2009-10
General Fund $1,116,000
Arts License Plate $3,184,000
National Endoment for the Arts $1,135,000
Source: http://www.ebudget.ca.gov/StateAgencyBudgets/8000/8260/spr.html

Using Sherry Stern's math equation dividing the General Fund allocation of $1.1 million by 36.6 million people, the General Fund invests about 3 cents per capita on the arts.

The sequential arts license plate fees go directly to the CAC Graphic Design License Plate Account. The "vanity" or personalized license plate fee is split between the California Arts Council and the Environmental License Plate Fund.

Thank you to the many Californians who support the arts by choosing to purchase a California Arts License Plate. https://vrir.dmv.ca.gov/ipp2/welcome.do

For more information about AB 700, please visit http://www.californiaartsadvocates.org/AB700.html