Advocacy and budgets

The Indianapolis Business Journal reports on nervousness in the art world that the city’s cultural budget is facing big cuts:

After Mayor Greg Ballard’s upset victory at the polls last November, local arts leaders were in a panic. They worried the no-nonsense former Marine would put public safety on a pedestal and slash Indianapolis’ funding for cultural groups. Now, they say their worst suspicions are being confirmed. Late last month, City-County Council President Bob Cockrum, who, like Ballard, is a Republican, warned the Indianapolis Consortium of Arts Administrators that the mayor intends to phase out the entire $1.5 million in funding it provides for cultural education and outreach.

“We obviously all recognize there are going to be cuts he needs to make,” said Glen Kwok, executive director of the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis. “But what was outlined to us was not reasonable. To have a three-year phase-out program to zero was completely unfathomable.”

And cuts to arts funding are just the beginning. Joseph Wynns, director of Indy Parks and Recreation, said the mayor has asked him to chop $2.3 million, or 13 percent, from his department’s $17 million budget.

Community leaders acknowledge the mayor must look for cuts to live within the property-tax caps passed by the Indiana General Assembly last spring. Those caps will phase in until 2010, greatly reducing local government’s largest source of revenue.

But they fret that areas like arts and parks are crucial quality-of-life amenities that help make Indianapolis an attractive place for professionals to live. …

I’ve only lived in Indiana for two years, and I don’t follow Indianapolis local politics. So I have no inside information on the budget debate. That said, I feel like someone ought to take on the role of devil’s advocate, so…

First, while it is true that arts and parks are important quality-of-life amenities, just about everything a municipal government supplies – public safety, pleasant sidewalks, safe and secure infrastructure for water and sewage, good public schools, driving conditions and public transportation, and various aspects of the social safety net – can be thought of as an amenity that helps attract new residents and retain old ones. I like a city with a vibrant cultural life, but that is only one of many aspects of a city or town that is going to matter to me as I make a choice of where to live. Government at every level has to strike a balance between different ways to use limited public funds [equating the marginal benefit per dollar spent across all possible uses, right?], and arts advocates would do well to appreciate that.

Second, a criticism I have heard many times about public funding of the arts is that it is regressive, a transfer of resources to amenities enjoyed primarily by the well-off. When advocates for arts funding make the argument that grants to culture are necessary to make the city attractive to “professionals”, they are essentially conceding the point. The strategic wisdom of saying arts funding ought to be directed at the preferences of the well-educated and well-paid is not evident to me, nor do I think it is good policy.

Third, I’m not sure what being a Marine (I once read that there is no such thing as a former Marine) has to do with anything. When I spent a few hair-raising years as a Dean of a school of fine arts, I had to make budgets in a situation where (1) my revenues were capped and (2) my current expenses exceeded my revenues, which meant (3) I had to make cuts. A Marine can’t make two plus two equal five, and neither could I. Budgets are like that.

Now, there can be legitimate debate over the degree to which arts funding should or should not be cut. But culture isn’t the only amenity of value, and, given the property tax cap, something has to give.

Thanks to Stephanie for the link.