Report from the California Art Council 9/15/22 Public Meeting
California Arts Council Opening Remarks and General Program Updates
September’s California Arts Council (CAC) meeting opened with a report from Interim Director Ayanna Kiburi who offered gratitude and acknowledgement of the work of the staff and Council over the last fiscal year, including administering over 2,000 grants to the field, and she welcomed new staff, including a promotion of Kristin Margolis who will serve as another director of program services with a specific focus on the California Creative Corps program. Notably, Kiburi also offered an update on the California Arts in Correction Program (AIC):
CAC received constructive feedback from several concerned contractors, comments and letters submitted via email, public comment at Council meetings, and a listening session on 8/25/22. In addition, CAC consulted with attorneys to decide what solutions could work to best serve constituents.
Based on the above, the following changes were made to the RFP that are able to be shared: AIC proposals will be able to be submitted electronically; the total amount awarded has been adjusted to $1.5 million so that there are more opportunities within a region to receive funding; submitters now have 48 hours to respond to a request for clarification from CAC on submitted proposals; CAC held a bidders conference to allow for questions and answers and clarification on requirements new process implemented.
CFTA made the following public comment at the meeting:
We ask that the council commit to full transparency for their funding & decision making process. We appreciate & support the Governance committee's recommendation to open all committee meetings to the public. We ask that the Arts in Corrections program, a critical program of the CAC be under the purview of the council not just the staff. Significant concerns have been raised by the recent RFP process that speak to the importance of council oversight and public accountability. We appreciate the policy committee's review of the AO models and fee structures and believe each program should be considered separately. We appreciate the inclusion of the summary of programs by the policy committee but noticed cultural districts are missing. We ask for a better understanding of how funds are being spent - it is unclear from the packet if CYD funds for example, that include a $40m appropriation from the CA budget, have been expended in total or just $14m. We believe an accounting of financials, how much has been appropriated and encumbered in total for the past 3 years should be included in every packet so the council and the public are aware of how funds are being allocated. Finally for future programming we strongly urge a move towards general operating support, common apps & a commitment to funding all budget size orgs but with an emphasis to support & build capacity for historically marginalized, under-resourced community led organizations, artists and culture bearers.
Update on California Cultural Districts funding (the FY 22-23 $307 billion California Budget includes $30 million for the California Cultural Districts Program): CAC is working with designated districts through the end of the year to determine what their needs are, develop a timeline, and how funding will be distributed. This will be brought to the Programs Policy Committee in November with the goal of being brought to the Council in December. Funding should start going out to the field in early 2023 with the first round of funding to focus just on existing districts, followed by expanding the program to fund new and developing districts.
Update on California Creative Corps program funding: Kristin Margolis organized a meet-and-greet with all Administrating Organizations (AOs) on Sep 9, 2022, as well as holding one-on-one sessions with all grantees the required paperwork was due on October 1 and funding should be delivered to AOs within 6-8 weeks in the hopes that AOs can begin granting funds for their respective programs in the beginning of 2023. Stay tuned, and be sure to join our Regional Conversations programs in November to learn more from AOs in your region.
Council Discusses and Decides on Creative Youth Development Funding Allocations
Voting item to approve the Allocations Committee Recommendations for Funding Cycle B Grantees, which are for JUMP StArts, Arts Education Exposure, Arts Integration Training, Artists in Schools, Creative Youth Development, Arts and Accessibility grants programs: The recommended allocations were approved for each category (reminder: those recommendations can be found in the meeting packet starting on page 47). Council discussion throughout the voting process did surface some generative dialogue in part about select programs, and in part about the grant review process at large.
In analyzing the demographics of review panels, Council Chair Lilia Gonzáles-Chávez noted that it would be great to see more presence from rural communities on the panels; Council Member Vicki Estrada agreed noting the importance of working to improve the diversity of review panel demographics across the board. (Of note: One public comment caller, Michael Angelo Camacho, shared that the technical logistics of being a panelist as well as delayed panelist payments have discouraged him from recommending being a panelist to peers.)
In analyzing the geographic locations of recommended grantees, Council Member Estrada noted that it would be great to have visual breakdown of where funded organizations are located year over year, which would be great for transparency as well for the field to see what counties get funding. Interim Director Kiburi noted that this should be possible.
There was not a recommended grantee for the Arts and Accessibility program ($500,000 allocation) due to lack of qualified applicants, spurring discussion about what led to this. Here is the breakdown: It centers around the role of AOs in general, and the overall allocation of administrative funds AOs can retain from their funding (more on this later in the meeting). For many years the Arts and Accessibility program was managed by one organization (National Arts Disability Center) for 20+ years with a $150k contract. When the program allocation was increased to $500k it was decided this should be an AO program and NADC chose not to apply due to concern over the percentage allowed for administrative costs. Thus, the Council decided to put the call out again noting that there is also going to be discussion about AO admin fees later in the meeting and Kiburi noted the Council could also consider having more than one AO for this program. Council Member Ellen Gavin suggested that perhaps if an AO does not come forward, perhaps there is a way for CAC to consult with disabled artists and create an artists program.
The funds for these programs all come from Creative Youth Development (CYD) funds legislation and can only be used for these programs. After the Cycle B allocations are approved there are $4 million unspent dollars + the $500k for Arts in Corrections that can be used for existing CYD programs. This was taken up in discussion (not voted upon) by the Council with the following key suggestions and comments:
Chair Gonzalez-Chavez offered two opportunities for moving forward:
Reinvest in programs that we just funded by extending grant periods from 1 year to 2 years; this option is expedient but Council would need to determine which programs get extended as there isn’t enough funding to extend every single one.
Identify reopening certain programs for projects not funded in this round. For example, Creative Youth Development had the most applications and had the largest number of lower scoring applicants. Multiple Council members proffered how to find a way to allocate money to lower scoring applicants and what possibilities could exist to offer assistance to applicants to ensure higher scores. This is important. In our Jan/Feb 2022 Regional Conversations, 30% of survey respondents expressed need for tech assistance, 20% desire assistance in strengthening local advocacy in underserved areas, and 25% seek grant programs that match the work orgs are actually doing and the burdensome nature of grant apps that directly prohibits many orgs from historically marginalized communities to apply. Gonzalez-Chavez further noted that technical assistance has come up as a need multiple times to the Council.
Council Member Jodie Evans pointed out that this type of technical assistance would likely create more work from staff and asked staff to weigh in the recommendations and discussion. Kiburi: A suggestion could be to extend funds for JUMP StArts program to two years, then open Creative Youth Development again. Between those two opportunities the funds could be used and anyone who received a three score can always reapply to any grant that reopens; part of CAC outreach could be targeted to those folks who didn’t get funded and support them with technical assistance.
Overall there was a general consensus that the above made sense, and that technical assistance options the Council would like to prioritize cannot come from the $4m CYD funds but should continue to be discussed. No decision was made, this discussion was for feedback only and the Council is also interested in hearing public opinion on the matters at hand.
Committee Reports Opened the Second Half of the Meeting
During the Programs Policy Committee report, committee members and staff proposed for consideration new parameters they’ve developed for compensating Administering Organizations (AOs) for program development and implementation costs associated with CAC grant programs. We learned that AOs were first implemented as partners to CAC programs in 2019 and that the agency still considers AO programs to be in pilot stage, meaning they are collecting data and analyzing effectiveness, equity and transparency. The committee is examining current guidelines for allowed administrative costs to determine if it makes sense to standardize this policy across all AO programs, even though the six current AO programs have such wide differences in complexity and scale. To that end, the committee proposed four different potential policy frameworks for Council to consider:
Standard percentage across AO grant programs: Administering Organizations can use a standard percentage of award amount to utilize for program development and implementation.
Cap on total dollar amount: AOs can utilize up to a certain dollar amount to put towards program development and implementation.
Tiered scale based on total number of grant awards: AOs can request up to a certain administrative cost amount based on the number of subgrants they are expected to issue.
Justification of request in application that aligns with program review criteria: Applicants to be AOs can request the amount they feel necessary to successfully design and implement the program. Review criteria reflect the appropriateness of this request to achieve CAC program goals.
Presented for discussion only, some of the stand out comments from council and staff included ideas for more effectively analyzing administrative costs, general consensus that more transparency is needed from AOs on articulating those costs, and that while there is criticism that AOs draw money away from artists or cultural producers, their local reach and field expertise can be essential to effectively operationalizing CAC programs. They are also useful in helping the CAC get large sums of money, especially legislatively mandated programs, out to the field. The rules governing CAC as a state agency add bureaucratic processes because they are largely designed for hiring contractors and paying after services are rendered, rather than grants which are prepaid. AOs also make it possible for CAC to assess equity outcomes because state agencies are not allowed, by law, to collect race and ethnicity data as part of awarding decisions. The conversation concluded with agreement that more analysis is underway.
The Legislative Committee gave updates on three pieces of legislation:
AB 179 - Budget Act of 2022 (Ting D).
SB 543 (Limón D) - requires the Department of General Services (DGS) to designate a person to serve as a nonprofit liaison whose responsibilities will include responding to complaints by nonprofit corporations about the department and assisting nonprofit corporations with complying with the department’s regulations and relevant statutes.
SB 628 - CA Creative Workforce Act (Allen D). The Committee encourages attendees to get to know SB 628 and what an exciting opportunity it is. The authorizing legislation was passed in the fall of 2021 and the field is currently advocating for the law to be funded. ** Be sure to sign up for CFTA Action Alerts to help get SB 628 funded **
Governance Committee - Council members Vicki Estrada and Ellen Gavin presented for discussion two ideas for expanding public engagement in the council’s work.
Structure of Council Meeting - request public comment during each agenda item. Ms. Estrada suggested that hearing from the public during item discussions would help council members be better informed.
Ideas for subcommittee transparency and more public engagement - the following ideas were discussed:
Suggested that subcommittee meetings are open to the public for comments. Discussion of this item revealed the desire to engage more people and ideas in the CAC’s work and the need to be able to freely think, talk, deliberate and work together on the subcommittee level in order to formulate ideas and recommendations to the council.
Proposed that non-council or public attendees who wish to be a voting member of committee must attend three sub meetings and be approved by chair. Further discussion on the technical challenges of permitting voting rights without formal guidelines.
Proposed revising the Standing Committees, as follows:
Combine Program Allocations and Program Policy Committee
Combine Innovations and Aspirations and Strategic Planning Committee into one committee with a new purpose: The CAC into the Future
Combine Legislative Committee and Special Liaison Committee
All of these items were being introduced for the first time so, because they weren’t on the formal agenda, they could not be voted on. Some of them require a by-laws change and have to be handled a certain way. It was determined that the Executive committee can change the meeting structure and will consider the public comment ideas. The other items will be for second reading for comments and vote.
The Equity Committee reported that they will be developing an SLP evaluation to learn about their reach and impact and equity outcomes.
Strategic Framework Committee, who is overseeing the development of the evaluation process, reported that they will be meeting twice a month to analyze the report and theory of change that was introduced to council in the August meeting and they would propose next steps and further public engagement.
Prepared by Tracy Hudak and Kara Q. Smith