Tuesday (2/23) on the Los Angeles Times blog Culture Monster, Mike Boehm writes, “Members of the Long Beach City Council hope to get City Hall off the backs of working artists, street performers and informal arts venues such as galleries, bookstores and coffee houses, while impaneling a new commission to brainstorm ways to boost the city government’s funding of the arts. Pegged as an ‘Arts and Cultural Initiative for Long Beach,’ the package of proposals comes from six of the nine council members, although not all are co-sponsors of every element. … The changes, council member Robert Garcia noted in a statement Monday announcing the proposed overhaul of existing policies, ‘come out of months of discussions with arts advocates, who helped identify [laws] that are obsolete or not conducive to a thriving urban arts community.’ … The potentially farthest-reaching proposal would establish a panel of as many as nine members with ‘proven expertise’ in the arts, business, finance and nonprofit management to generate ideas for boosting city funding of the arts, and for improving how those funds are allocated.”
Posted February 24, 2010
