City of Lawrence

Lawrence Cultural Arts Commission (LCAC)

Monthly Meeting, December 29, 2014

City Commission Room, City Hall, 6 E. 6th Street

Members present:        Chair: Katherine Simmons, Christie Dobson, John Hachmeister, Patrick Kelly, Michel Loomis, Mike Maude, Kathy Porsch, Richard Renner

Members absent:          Mandy Enfield, Lois Greene, Jerry Johnson

Also present:                Christina McClelland, City Liaison; Diane Stoddard, Associate City Manager; Sarah Bishop, Lawrence Arts Center Director of Grants and Special Projects; members of the public, Thom Weik, K. T. Walsh, and Judy Romero.

MINUTES

Chair Katherine Simmons called the meeting to order at 6:37 p.m. in the Lawrence City Council Chambers at Lawrence City Hall, 6 E. 6th Street.

Action Items:

· Kathy Porsch made the following motion, which was seconded by Mike Maude and approved unanimously by the LCAC members present:

The Lawrence Cultural Arts Commission recommends that the City of Lawrence partner with the Lawrence Arts Center in the submission of a National Endowment for the Arts Our Town grant application for expansion of the Free State Festival in 2016 and 2017 into an international arts and culture festival.

New Business:

1.   Christina McClelland announced her resignation effective in mid January because her husband had been unable to obtain a position in the Lawrence area.

2.   Diane Stoddard said there will be another search launched for the Arts and Culture Director position, which will be posted as soon as possible. The search committee will be comprised largely of the same individuals who served on the committee previously, She said. Katherine added that one of the two LCAC committee members will need to be replaced as former search committee member Mandy Enfield's period of service on the LCAC ends in January. An LCAC volunteer will be sought in the January LCAC meeting, she said.

Old Business:

1.   Lawrence Art Center request to partner with the City of Lawrence for NEA Our Town grant. Patrick commended the Lawrence Arts Center for jointly hosting with the City a community engagement meeting on Dec. 15 to gain public input into the continued expansion of the Free State Festival and what might be proposed to the NEA in the grant application due Jan. 15th for support in festival years 2016 and 2017. The NEA requires partnership with a municipality for this type of grant.

Katherine reminded the LCAC members that it had passed a motion conditionally recommending the City's partnership on the grant application at the pre-proposal stage on basis of receiving the full proposal with enough time for review and comment prior to making a recommendation to the Lawrence City Commission in regards to partnering in the full grant application. This special meeting is convened to consider the proposal, which the LAC provided Dec. 28, she said.

John asked, whether a partnership agreement with Haskell Indian Nations University had been completed.

Sarah answered that, due to holiday travel by Haskell officials, an agreement was not yet formalized. We really want to work with Haskell due to our good discussions initially with the faculty members who would be directly involved, but the process of gaining approval through the President's Office has been problematic with the holidays, she said. Haskell student films would be student driven. However, she said, if the Haskell partnership cannot be confirmed before the grant deadline, the LAC will partner with Centro Hispano and has an agreement with Lydia Diebolt, Director, to provide a letter. In that case, we would be working with middle school students who may do silent films aimed at illustrating issues that bilingual students face.

Kathy asked why not both? Sarah said, based on feedback on previous grant applications, reviewers might see the proposed program as too diffuse if they propose do both; thus, although LAC may work with both groups within the two-year grant period it will propose only one partnership in the grant proposal.

Sarah said LAC is going to wait for the Haskell decision as long as possible and asked how long can they can wait to send the proposal to the City Commission. Diane said January 7th will be the deadline to provide the final proposal to the City for presentation to the City Commission.

John asked why they chose Nina Katchadourian as the outside guest artist, since she appears to have extremely limited curatorial experience. Sarah said the LAC has worked with her in the past, including on the Free State Festival in 2014. Nina does a wide variety of work and has a lot of international contacts and connections, Sarah said; she was selected for her international connections to help match up Lawrence artists with international artists in various disciplines.

Christie asked what the timeline is. Sarah said the grant is due Jan. 15th, there is no way around that so all the final details will have to be in place by then. We cannot access the grants.gov forms until Jan. 8, she said, and the whole application is submitted as paste-in text into form fields and some parts are check boxes. Christie asked if Van Go is listed as a partner. Sarah said no, although Van Go partnered in the 2014 and 2015 Free State Festivals and likely will partner in the 2016 and 2017 festivals as well. We must show that we're seeking support for an entirely new phase of the project and one way we're trying to do that is to say we are going to attract international artists, another way is to show new partners that pick up on the international theme, Sarah said.

John asked what venues might be used for screening along the Ninth St. Corridor, as mentioned on page 13. He said he was concerned about the lack of venues being identified in the grant proposal, which requests $500,000.

Richard pointed out that St. Luke's AME Church is committed. Sarah said yes, but they have not yet determined what they might do. She said Lawrence Creates, the Maker Space is one venue that has expressed interest and last year the Turnhalle was used for projection inside, it probably will be another venue.

John asked, isn't it rather unusual to be asking for so much money without greater clarity about what you will do with it? Sarah says the Festival has used many venues before, John said, but if this is all predicated on getting venues on Ninth St. and they are not identified is that sufficient to show what the public gets out of this? What is the pay-off to the community if there is one venue on Ninth St.? Why is the focus on Ninth St. here?

Sarah said the Ninth St. focus is strategic in showing continued investment in something the NEA has already funded through ArtsPlace America. I can't answer the question of what will Ninth St. be, that is for the community as a whole to answer, but we need to show that activities are going on, she said. Much of this kind of detail remains vague at this stage because situations change over time. The NEA understands this. It's hard to get venues confirmed three years out. For example, Pachamama's was really enthusiastic, but now they're closing, so that kind of thing has to remain a little loose, she said. The infrastructure aspect is challenging, Sarah said.

Mike said it would not be limited to the Ninth St. Corridor, would it?

Sarah said no, the festival will be in venues throughout the Cultural District.

Katherine said I think also you're saying you're going to take nuggets created by as yet unnamed artists and exhibit and incorporate them along Ninth Street and leave the creation to the artists. We may be limiting our vision of what a venue might be, as well. It might be a temporary unique lighting to a street, things like that can be incorporated by an artist, but we don't know what those are until the artists actually create them.

Sarah said, yes, we have to have a leap of faith in the artists that will be engaged in the whole process.

Michel said she would challenge anyone to predict what an artist might create.

John asked about the unconfirmed Sprint funding. Sarah said one of the possible revenue sources is a grant request to Sprint each year for $50,000 per year (two grant requests totaling $100,000).

Kathy asked why the anticipated $60,000 request to the City would not be in the budget now rather than requested later outside the process. Diane said the City Staff's concern was that the initial letter stated that there would not be a request for matching funds from the City of Lawrence, so it should not go into the budget now. Kathy said it seems that it could be listed as a pending request rather than one that is confirmed so it is clear what is likely to be asked of the City. This should not be a separate, later request, she said.

Sarah said this is a festival that we feel benefits the whole city so we make this request for $60,000 each year to support it separately from the official budget. We have talked with Sprint and feel fairly confident that we will get it, but if we do not the City's support will be critical.

Diane said she agreed that maybe the best way is to show it in the budget now and show it as pending. Make it clear in your cover letter that LAC is not asking the City Commission to approve the funding at this point, she told Sarah.

Katherine pointed out that, due to Christina's resignation, the LAC will need to replace her letter of support and designation as the City liaison. Sarah agreed and said Dave Corliss would be one choice, or Diane Stoddard, who was the liaison last year. Diane said she would be willing to serve as the City liaison again for purposes of the grant application and provide the letter.

Katherine asked if the members of the public present had any comments.

K. T. Walsh said she had concerns that East Lawrence residents are listed as beneficiaries of the grant but the artwork is ephemeral and said she thought there ought to be something lasting to benefit the community for that amount of money.

Sarah asked if it would help to clarify in the grant that the focus is on East Lawrence artists who would be given preference. K. T. said yes, but you're using the community for something that doesn't last. Build wheel chair ramps.

Sarah said the grant does not allow building permanent structures, but other things that come out of the arts can benefit the community as a whole, such as people going out to eat when they come the festival, or coming from out of town and staying overnight.

Katherine said a festival is not permanent. You may be undervaluing the importance of experiences and memories that will be created by a festival like this, she said. This grant is about people interacting and the sense of community--yes they are leveraging other grants, but that is how the grants process works.

Thom said part of what you're doing is focusing on something you're building over time to show how it's an expansion of the existing festival, right?

Sarah said yes, the goal is to get the money out to artists and hopefully bring people together. There cannot be a permanent structure built through this grant.

Katherine asked if there was further discussion, and then called for a motion. Kathy made a motion to recommend that the City of Lawrence partner with the Lawrence Arts Center in submitting the Our Town grant application to the NEA for support of the Free State Festival in 2016 and 2017 and Mike seconded the motion. It passed unanimously.

The meeting adjourned at 7:25 p.m.