Julianna Yau’s blog

These are my raw notes from the Creative Enterprise Forum. These notes are not exhaustive, and are as much as I could record quickly. Commentary to follow.

Things of note:

• create and fund a regional arts & culture development & promotion body → outstanding item to address
• cultural vitality → sustainability
• arts, culture & heritage
• ultimate goal is to generate private employers
• attract the best minds, generate new ideas, wrap a business around it, create jobs

Ultimate Goals

• improving our community’s quality of life
• attracting & retaining the best & brightest artistic & technical minds
• cultivating the not-for profit and for-profit creative economy
• fostering enterpreneurism and bold, new ideas

Members of note

• Doug Craig – Mayor, City of Cambridge → Vision Task Force
• Bruce Gordon, Manulife Financial & Manulife Bank → Structure Task force
• -Pauline Houston, City of Kitchener → Structure
• Mike Murray, Region of Waterloo → Resources Task force
• Brenda Halloran, Mayor, City of Waterloo → Resources Task Force

“The Prosperity Council and its supporters believe that a creative sector with a sustainable infrastructure is necessary to fully realize our long-term growth opportunities”

How they plan to do this

• must make a “made in Waterloo” solution
• shouldn’t be a copy of other “creative communities”
• long-term vision must be broad and emphasize creativity and innovation across all sectors of community
• also requires a short-term focus on actionable items (quick wins) that help build momentum
• need to develop a framework or infrastructure that will support the development and implementation of the Vision over many years

5 key themes

• sustainability for creative orgs and individuals
• leveraging collaboration within the creative sector (and other sectors)
• communication & marketing
• education and community engagement
• bold and undiscovered ideas
• world-class institution for the arts, like CIGI or PI

Goal: to create a world-leading environment that

• transforms the human experience
• makes Waterloo Region one of the most attractive and compelling places on the planet
• fosters artistic creativity
• supports constant innovation in commerce & technology

“This successful human environment fosters and promotes Cultural, Economic, Environmental and Social well being for all of its constituents”

What has been done

• already achieved reasonable success in each of the four pillars of sustainability, but have not committed the same level of resources and attention to the arts and culture sector as some of the others
• we are recommending the near-term focus be leveraged towards Cultural vitality (rough note)
• researched & inventoried; compared results with the “Business for the Arts” national fundings survey of arts and culture across the country

Resources

• base sustainability shortfall is $2.5-$5 million annually
• not getting our “fair share” of federal and provincial funding
• local “performing arts organizations” get about 7.5% of their funding from provincial/federal agencies – the national average is 15%
• local “museums and art galleries” get about 10% of their funding from prov & fed gov agencies – the national average is 60%
• private sector funding of performing arts lower than national/provincial averages (relatively small # of corporate supporters)
• business community is not supporting the arts as much here
• companies know they need to give, but don’t know how to do it in arts & culture heritage → don’t know which festival to support, for example
• municipal per capital is “middle of the pack” ($15.50) compared to similar Ontario municipalities, but lower than some important comparators/competitors:
  Ottawa 18.07
  Toronto 24.82
  Hamilton 37.27
• Toronto stepped up funding for arts & culture post-SARS to get people back

Needs

• additional stable base operating funding
• additional special funding to support bold new initiatives (similar to venture capital)
• company needs to be able to make mistakes
  arts funding too tied to organizational funding
• additional funding for sector marketing (raising profile, awareness, support in the community)

Human Resource needs

• attract, hire, retain high quality, skilled, creative staff and managers
• attract and deploy volunteers efficiently and effectively
• attract well-qualified BOD members
• management and leadership training & development for staff, volunteers and BOD
• develop joint benefit plans

Physical resource needs

• affordable, accessible space for rehearsals, performance, meetings
• can be shared space

Financial resources

• public
  • local government
  • provincial
  • federal
• foundations/Not For Profits
• private sector
  • corporate
  • individuals
• high-impact: increase property taxes and other things

Recommendations will

• implement vision
• put initial focus on the arts, culture and heritage sectors
• engage more than just those who participate in the arts, culture, and heritage sectors of Waterloo Region

Rec #1: Establishment of “Barnraisers’ council of Waterloo Region”

• how to deal with issues going forwards
• provide high level, strategic consensus building that is necessary for a large, multi-faceted community to adapt continually
• identify strategic issues & recommend possible responses
• be guided by the need to achieve balance in our overall objectives
• include reps form business, local gov, health care & education, arts/creative sector, foundations & NFP orgs
• include individuals who can make commitments or cause those commitments to be made; commit themselves and their orgs to a role in the solutions and also get others to do so

Recommendation #2

• establishment of an “enabling organization” for the creative sector
• provides services to enable the arts, culture, and heritage sectors to achieve their potential
• Waterloo Regional Arts Council 2.0
• encourage and enable the creative sector
• help provide the environment for arts to create great art
• allow orgs and individuals to focus on their “core” business
• encourage divergent orgs to find & build upon common purpose
• find centers of excellence and build on them
• org would provide/coordinate:
  • admin services
  • human resources
  • benefit plans
  • audience development programs
  • marketing assistance
  • festivals
  • grant writing assistance
  • advocacy
  • corporate funding –> facilitate funding through corporate funding program
  • physical space –> 5-10 years, Accelerator Center equiv for arts

Barnraiser’s Council

• David Johnston has agreed to assist in the formation of the council and will take the lead on determining its initial membership
• goal is to have members in place by the end of 2009

The Task Force Co-chairs will continue in their roles to:

• determine initial board, structure, by-laws etc
• secure 3-5 years of guaranteed funding for the Enabling Org
• initiate search for a high-level Executive Director
• address the creative sector base sustainability funding gap-it cannot be solved by any one sector –all must step up!
• request for additional investment in arts & culture to all 3 sectors – municipal, businesses, fed/prov governments
  • (approx 1M/yr from each)
  • ask the Region to incrementally increase funding by $1 per resident and the local municipalities to also incrementally increase funding by $1 per resident

This is a community investment agenda: all must participate!

Change mind shift from “charity” to “investment”

New leadership

• Engage a diverse alliance of young leaders to work together with us towards strengthening and developing our arts, culture and heritage environment
• met with group under 40 – high school to 40
• want to get them engaged; eg new media
• the “final” product in 10 or 20 years will look much different from what is set out here. It must, by its nature, or it will not be an eneabler and encourager of adaptation through innovation and creativity”

Mentioned spOtlight festival in passing

Talked about a creative economy

Peter Braid

• $50 mil invested in post-secondary education
• $50 million to Institute to Quantum Computing
• Vital Signs

Cheryl Ewing

• eyeGo

Other speakers

• CCT website (what the heck is this?)
• focus on HERITAGE → Oktoberfest, Grand River (the river)
• education
• want to develop a recognized arts institute

(My laptop’s battery died at this point, as there was no where to plug it in)

Tags: art, creative enterprise forum, politics, waterloo