To support San Francisco’s recovery from pandemic shutdowns, Mayor London Breed announced on Monday $12 million dollars in funding for arts groups. Doled out in amounts ranging from $9,000 to $450,000, the new round of Grants for the Arts supports large institutions such as the San Francisco Symphony and San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, as well as a long list of smaller organizations. Among those are after-school program Youth Art Exchange, transgender dance company Fresh Meat Productions, Latinx arts and community space Galería de la Raza and Filipino American theater company Bindlestiff Studio. There are 250 recipients in total. Read more.
The EDA (Economic Development Agency) received $3 billion from the Biden Administration’s American Rescue Plan to invest in distressed and underserved communities impacted by the coronavirus pandemic. The funding will be administered through six programs that support infrastructure, innovation, and workforce training:
Build Back Better Regional Challenge ($1 bil.)
Good Jobs Challenge ($500 mil.)
Economic Adjustment Assistance Challenge ($500 mil.)
Indigenous Communities Challenge ($100 mil.)
Travel, Tourism, and Outdoor Recreation Grants ($750 mil.)
Statewide Planning, Research and Networks Grants ($90 mil.)
The County described its $975 million plan as a “once-in-a-generation opportunity to reshape and rebuild Los Angeles County.” The plan invests federal ARP funds in Los Angeles communities hard hit by the COVID-19 pandemic and advances the County’s equity focused programs and priorities. Eligibility, application, and guidelines for Arts and Culture’s ARP programs will be announced later in the year. All funds must be dispersed by 2024.
The Small Business Administration (SBA) issued two press releases this week that I wanted to bring your attention.
SBA created a streamlined PPP Forgiveness Portal for borrowers with individual Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loans of $150,000 or less to submit simple forgiveness applications directly to SBA, as long as your specific lender participates in the program.
SBA issued a Shuttered Venue Operators Grant (SVOG) press releasethis week to commemorate an important milestone. As of this week, over $7.5 billion has been awarded to more than 10,000 performing arts organizations, museums, movie theaters, theater producers, and talent representatives across the country.
Despite California leading the nation in vaccinations, with more than 44 million doses administered and 75 percent of the eligible population having received at least one dose, the state is seeing increasing numbers of people who refused to get the vaccine being admitted to the ICU and dying. This increase is heavily due to the Delta variant, which is more contagious and kills people faster.
Today, the SBA released a brand-new set of FAQs dated July 22, 2021, that include important new SVOG policies, including clarifying eligibility criteria, uses of funds as well as overall guidance on processing and appealing decisions. For all SVOG applicants, I encourage you to read these FAQs from top to bottom. Do not rely on the asterisk * to notify you of a new addition because it hasn’t been applied consistently. I will be reviewing these FAQs tonight and I will share my analysis with you and answer your questions tomorrow morning at 11:00am ET during my weekly Office Hours with Nina.
Creating the largest small business relief program in the nation, the Plan invests an additional $1.5 billion for a total of $4 billion in direct grants to California’s small businesses – on top of $6.2 billion in tax relief. Working to address opportunity gaps, the Plan also invests $35 million for the California Dream Fund to provide microgrants of up to $10,000 to seed entrepreneurship and spur small business creation in underserved groups and communities. In addition, $500 million in new grants will be used to create opportunities for workers who lost their jobs during the pandemic.
As a result, theater leaders are pressing lawmakers in Sacramento for legislation that would provide aid to help theaters cover the explosion of costs. There are two main initiatives: A one-time $50 million subsidy included in the state budget for struggling small theaters, and another that would set up a state agency to handle the cost of processing the new payroll requirements.
Here’s a roundup of the week’s legislative updates and COVID relief grants impacting the arts.
We are happy to report that applicants for this new grant program will NOT have to be a previous NEA grantee to be eligible to apply. There is a quick turnaround time for submitting applications.
ELIGIBLE applicants with incomplete info will now be asked to update info before possible decline.
The SBA is moving the SVOG program out of the Office of Disaster Assistance and into the Office of Capital Access, which ran the highly successful $800 billion PPP program that concluded on May 31st. Additionally, SBA is integrating experts from the efficiently executed Restaurant Revitalization Fund to work on SVOG, along with other interagency reviewers. Perhaps, most importantly, the new SVOG team leaders are new Biden Administration political appointees, who are committed to cutting through the red tape to achieve fast results.
A major highlight of the initiative is the distribution of one-time $5,000 grants to more than 3,000 artists to create public art across the city’s five boroughs. The New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) will begin distributing the grants through local arts organizations in July.
If universities, such as Yale, Stanford and UCLA, are planning to require returning students to be fully vaccinated, why can’t performing arts venues do the same? This policy would offer audience members some insurance that the stranger crammed into the seat next to them wasn’t a potential petri dish of COVID variants eagerly seeking a crack in their newly erected wall of immunity.
SBA will announce Priority 1 (90% or more gross income loss) round of awards by late May. Priority 2 in mid June and Priority 3 in late June. In order to facilitate receiving the proceeds, SBA will follow the protocols described at www.grants.gov for awardees to request federal funds, submit progress reports, and certify and agree to terms and conditions. As a reminder, unless you also submitted your 2020 tax return, you will not receive the lump sum of your award. You will likely receive your SVOG funds in disbursements of up to 4 payments.
Please continue to encourage your local performing arts organizations, venues, museums, movie theater operators, and talent representatives to apply for an SVOG grant. There are ample funds still available.
“We need to have this moment to reflect,” said Baker, “and artists are who we look to for the meaning, for the hope, for the clarity, for this cohesion, this sense of belonging — this sense of, How do we come out of this?”
In an attempt to respond to scores of complaints about relaunching the SVOG application portal on a Saturday with very little notice, SBA has postponed the relaunch now to Monday, April 26, 2021 @ Noon ET.
The Shuttered Venues Operators Grant (SVOG) application portal opens TOMORROW, April 8, 2021. The SBA updated its FAQs yesterday (look for the asterisk * to see which questions/answers have been modified or added.) Below are some key resources to prepare your SVOG application.
The Shuttered Venues Operators Grant (SVOG) application portal opens TOMORROW, April 8, 2021. The SBA updated its FAQs yesterday (look for the asterisk * to see which questions/answers have been modified or added.) Below are some key resources to prepare your SVOG application.
“With planning windows of many months, a performance season was difficult to imagine until today,” said Thor Steingraber, executive director of the Younes and Soraya Nazarian Center for the Performing Arts in Northridge. “Today’s announcement, at a minimum, provides arts leaders an on ramp to planning and announcing future performances, with the caveat that circumstances on the ground may change.”
The €2bn total pandemic emergency aid for the arts is equivalent to Germany’s annual federal culture budget. Culture Minister Monika Grütters said in a statement that the new cash injection for the arts—delivered under a programme known as Neustart Kultur (New Start for Culture)—is aimed at “offering a beacon of hope and encouragement to a cultural scene that has suffered mortal wounds.”
Getting a COVID-19 vaccination at the Mexican Heritage Plaza in San Jose has become a more pleasant experience. That’s largely due to a pilot program that provides live music, including Afro-Latin jazz, R&B and mariachi for people in line for their shot or waiting out the observation period after receiving the vaccine.
The artists receiving the grants are not required to do anything in return. But YBCA CEO Deborah Cullinan told KQED that they will ask the artists to complete occasional surveys about how the guaranteed income payments are affecting their lives. “You can’t demand things of people, but we do need data,” she told the station.
Qualifications for the program include being a resident of San Francisco and being an artist “whose artistic practice is rooted in a historically marginalized community,” which Cullinan noted does not exclude anyone from any cultural or racial group but is meant to encourage artists from underrepresented communities to apply.
The Music Center in downtown Los Angeles is expected to announce Thursday that it is the first performing arts organization in the country to receive a UL “healthy building” verification, representing high standards for air quality at four venues — Walt Disney Concert Hall, Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Mark Taper Forum and Ahmanson Theatre.
Without a moment to spare, the United States Senate just voted overwhelmingly 92-to-7 to extend the PPP application deadline from March 31, 2021 to May 31, 2021. The House had already passed this legislation 415-to-3 earlier this month, so it now moves to the President’s desk for his signature and certain enactment.
Many arts organizations said business as usual will not return for months — perhaps years. Institutions that have outdoor areas are intent on making use of that space, while groups that don’t are focused on securing an outdoor site. Large venues that would lose money operating at reduced capacity are instead mostly planning online shows for summer while hoping for a brighter, less distanced fall.
The application window has been extended to March 26th, 2021 at 5:00 pm. There is no revenue cap in this round. Beginning March 31, Round 4 notification of awards will be announced. To apply and learn more, please visit our CA Relief Grants webpage.
Collectively, with your voice and our lobbying, we advocated to the state for funding specifically for our sector and on Feb 23, SB 87 was signed into law approving $50 million in funding for nonprofit cultural institutions. It is critical the field knows about this funding opportunity and takes advantage of it.
The idea, says one of the boosters, Nina Ozlu Tunceli, chief counsel of government and public affairs and executive director of the Americans for the Arts Action Fund, is to see “more of a multi cross-lateral approach to get arts in every federal agency to be part of their planning and programming.”