Monday, October 31, 2005
Distorting Arts Funding in San Antonio
Via ArtsJournal.com, I see that Roddy Stinson, apparently a regular columnist at San Antonio's "Express-News," is all bent out of shape over an increase in San Antonio increased funding for the Arts and what he sees as the failure of a new Arts community foundation called "theFund." But let's take a look at what he's saying. Before I go further, I should clarify that I've never heard of Stinson or theFund before, so my argument is based solely on his article, the San Antonio city government website, and thefundsa.org.
First, Stinson clearly doesn't think that the government should be in the business of funding the Arts -- I disagree, but I respect his position and his right to it, and I'll save arguing against it for another day. He is dismayed that San Antonio's FY'06 budget includes a 37% increase in arts funding, which totals out to $4.9 Million. In an effort to inflate the appearance of the total, he observes that it "represents 12 percent of projected revenue from the city's hotel/motel tax collections." But a quick check of the budget summary provided by the City of San Antiono reveals that "The FY 2006 Proposed Budget appropriation for All Funds is $1.721 billion." The Arts budget makes up 0.28% of the total FY'06 budget.
Note additionally that, for example, the proposed Golf Fund budget is $6.4 Million -- true, much of that is golf revenue, but the Golf Fund faces a $688,642 shortfall, which was reduced from a projected $795,000 shortfall. One of the changes that helped with that reduction was an increase in golf-cart rental fees "by $2 for 18 holes (from $21.50 to
$23.50) and by $1 for nine holes (from $12.50 to $13.50)." Surely whether we think that the government should subsidize the Arts and Golf or not, we can agree that there's a _stronger_ case to be made for funding the arts.
Stinson then turns his attention to theFund. True, $203,926 when compared with $4.9 Million doesn't seem like much money -- it's just over 4%. But there are several important factors that Stinson ignores:
1. This first $203,926 was raised during the first 4 months of the theFund's active fund raising efforts. (Note as well that the $4.9 Million represents 12 months) Building a fund raising program takes time -- donors have to be persuaded that they should give their money to you instead of somebody else, and since they are already overwhelmed with solicitations it's not easy or fast. $203,926 sounds like a pretty good start, actually.
2. theFund's primary fundraising tool is payroll deductions through participating companies, which means a high volume of small gifts, and means only getting those small gifts from people whose employer things theFund is important enough to set up participation. Again, 200K sounds pretty good, especially for the first attempt.
3. Furthermore, the rule of thumb for funding sources is that the vast bulk of dollars raised comes from a small number of large gifts, and the big annual appeals and direct marketing programs are used primarily as a tool for collecting a list of donors with interest in your program. Then your research department culls the larger gifts for people who are actually rich, does research on them, and passes the list on to the frontline fundraisers who then start cultivating major gifts. It's far too early to tell whether theFund can raise big money, since cultivating the major gifts takes time and staffing resources. And according to executive director Ron Rubbo "We had no heavy-duty campaign in that area [soliciting major gifts from wealthy individuals]. . . We focused on workplace giving."
The bulk of Stinson's scorn is reserved for the fact that only $11,195 came from sources other than payroll deductions, and "Only $2,100 was spontaneously contributed by arts supporters who responded to campaign advertising and visited the Web site." He seems to think these small numbers disproves the notion that "Surely it would be successful. Surely the town's arts-loving citizens would respond. Surely the arts/culture-industry's bureaucrats, flacks, friends and well-heeled admirers would step up to the passing plate and toss in enough cash to demonstrate their commitment to the cause." But if Stinson knew anything about Development, or had actually listened to what Ron Rubbo was telling him, he would know that people don't give unless they are asked (and a TV ad doesn't count -- I suspect those ads were really more for PR than for solicitation.) and that the big bucks that would support the theory will only arrive when a robust Major Gifts program is out there soliciting major gifts, which Rubbo says they haven't started doing yet. . . Presumably because they've only been fundraising for 4 months.
The city budget and theFund appear together in this column so that Stinson can "prove" that the people who say they want funding for the Arts aren't willing to pay for it themselves and so resort to scamming the public. Of course his arguments don't hold up to scrutiny -- and I'm sure there are plenty of holes I haven't addressed here. We should certainly have robust public discussion of Arts Funding, (and I'm prepared to be wrong and/or not get what I want) but can we please have the discussion led by people who aren't hacks?
posted by Galen H. Brown
3:47 PM
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