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Join us in working to restore public support for the arts and culture in British Columbia.
Urgent update, May 31 2010 It turns out that when the B.C. Liberals told the public about the new criteria for Gaming Direct Access grants for support of the arts and culture, they lied. They said that arts festivals would still be funded -- months later, it turns out that they don't consider writers festivals, theatre festivals or music festivals to be arts festivals at all. They said that arts programs for youth would still be supported -- but it turns out that they secretly changed the criteria to make sure that almost none of those programs would be eligible. The Minister responsible for the Gaming Branch, Rich Coleman, has nothing of value to say on the subject, and betrays his ignorance of the non-profit sector more and more with every new statement he makes. The B.C. Liberals hope that supporters of the arts and culture will give up and stop calling for access to the arts throughout this province. We won't go away. We are writing, e-mailing and phoning our MLAs and members of cabinet, and we won't stop now.
Here's one of the responses to this policy change, and to the Minister's comments in the press.
The grey square is a symbol of a future without art -- a future we are working to avoid. After decades of barely-there support for the arts and culture from the B.C. provincial government, in late August and early September of 2009, Gordon Campbell's government announced massive cuts. First, they announced that the share of casino revenues that traditionally went to support the activities of charities, including non-profit arts organizations, was going to be used for other, unspecified purposes. Then, in the September budget, they announced that the legislative appropriation for the B.C. Arts Council would be reduced by 81% for 2009-10, reduced by 85% for 2010-11, and then further reduced by 92% for 2011-12. The outpouring of response from the community prompted the legislature's Finance Committee to recommend reinstatement of funding at already-meagre 2008-09 levels; however, the government ignored that recommendation, instead cutting the BC Arts Council and Gaming funding for the arts for 50% in its March 2010 budget, and attempting to politicize arts funding by creating a new politically-directed fund separate from the independent arms-length BC arts council.
These cuts will affect access to the arts and culture throughout the province. They will affect jobs, both in the arts and among the business that sell goods and services to artists and arts organizations. The cuts are a bad choice economically, a bad choice culturally, and save the government almost nothing: expenditure on arts and culture in B.C. was one-twentieth of one percent of the provincial budget prior to the cuts.
If you are concerned about the cultural and intellectual health of our communities, you have to help us change the government's mind, before the damage is beyond repair.