QUESTION
What are the reasons for DCLA's reliance on one-time council funds to cover the Social Inclusion Grants (SIG) operating costs and the exclusion of $45,000,000 urged funding in the executive budget?
2:54:12
·
3 min
The council member inquires about the Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA) relying on one-time council funds to cover the operating costs of the Social Inclusion Grants (SIG) program and the absence of $45,000,000 in funding that the council urged to be included in the executive budget.
- The DCLA commissioner explains the impact of the pandemic on audience engagement and funding sources like foundations and corporations shifting priorities.
- Despite financial constraints, the commissioner highlights the city's ongoing commitment to arts and culture through capital investments in communities.
- All city agencies had to reduce budgets due to the fiscal crisis, but restorations in the upcoming fiscal year will provide more robust funding for programs like the Cultural Development Fund (CDF).
- The commissioner assures that fiscal year 2025 will see improvements and increased funding compared to the current fiscal year.
Carlina Rivera
2:54:12
Why is DCLA relying on the council's one shot the one shots to cover the sig's operating costs.
2:54:22
Why was the funding the 45,000,000 at Council urged the administration to include, not included in the executive budget.
Laurie Cumbo
2:54:30
Okay.
2:54:31
I want to thank you for your question.
2:54:33
I appreciate your view in terms of the partnership.
2:54:40
But I wanna say, I have to respectfully disagree on our willingness to be a partner.
2:54:46
I feel while the testimony may seem flowery, that may just be in my delivery.
2:54:52
But there's a whole lot of really critical substance.
2:54:55
Just as I add $24,000,000 to Nureka, to build this world class state of the art just in your district, That's real dollars.
2:55:04
Those are real capital dollars invested into the cultural community of New York City.
2:55:09
No other city in the world is making cultural investments in bipoch led communities like New York City, and it's real.
2:55:16
Our commitment to the cultural community has been consistent.
2:55:21
And I would say, a major aspect of what you are highlighting and noting is something that the field is experiencing on a hold.
2:55:28
We are the only consistent thunder for arts and culture in New York City on a consistent basis.
2:55:36
We are not changing our platform.
2:55:38
The challenge that we're having on so many levels is that were coming back from a pandemic, which means that many of our audiences and international visitors had not quite returned to full capacity.
2:55:49
That's one 2, many of our foundations and corporations are also changing their funding in terms of looking at different areas to fund when they had been longtime cultural funders and partners.
2:56:01
So organizations are taking up really important issues like the climate control, the environment, following the many different issues that we face, the black lives matter movement, social justice issues, and they are moving into those very critical issues, not recognizing that the arts and culture are at the foundation of those issues and are the real changes of age age age change agents to making a lot of those changes happen.
2:56:33
So we wanna bring our foundation and corporate partners and individual givers to understanding that we have created a portfolio, a cultural portfolio of how we support art and culture in New York City, and we need that level of consistency to maintain and to grow as we're fighting through really difficult economic times in the city of New York.
Carlina Rivera
2:56:55
But but knowing these challenges, why would the city then make the cut?
2:56:58
So we should be stepping up to provide support in these times of need.
Laurie Cumbo
2:57:04
We're in a fiscal crisis, mayor Eric Adams has demonstrated in the 1st 2 fiscal years that he has an unwavering support to art and culture.
2:57:13
But like every agency across the city every single agency had to tighten their belts.
2:57:19
And many of these agencies tightened their belts in the 1st fiscal year and the 2nd year as well as the cost reduction exercises that they had to undergo in this fiscal year.
2:57:30
We've had major restorations put forward.
2:57:33
These restorations are going to help us in fiscal year 25.
2:57:37
It's gonna help us to restore so many of the programs.
2:57:40
And provide more robust funding for our CDF applicants and making sure that as we launch the application just yesterday, that those organizations are going to be able to receive a greater level of funding than in the previous year but we are happy to move forward with understanding that fiscal year 25 is gonna be better and bigger than fiscal year 24.
