Daily Archives: September 14, 2007

Arts Partners, City of Peoria

ArtsPartners makes its case for public funding

ArtsPartners LogoCouncilmen Bob Manning and Ryan Spain listened to ArtsPartners representatives make the case for continued public funding of their organization this morning at City Hall. Although the meeting was called by the mayor, he did not attend. Instead, Dr. Peter Couri led the meeting.

Couri gave a brief history of ArtsPartners and then turned it over to others in attendance to give their views on the importance of continued funding.

Julie Russell, past president of ArtsPartners, distributed an official statement (PDF) that answers many of the objections that have been raised. One point she stressed was that ArtsPartners relies largely on city subsidy so as not to compete for donations with other arts groups.

George Brown, Department of Theatre Arts Chair at Bradley University, stated that he believed the funding was not only necessary, it wasn’t enough. He cited a report released by Americans for the Arts in May of this year (titled “Arts and Economic Prosperity“) which states, “the nonprofit arts and culture industry generates $166.2 billion in economic activity every year — $63.1 billion in spending by organizations and an additional $103.1 billion in event-related spending by their audiences.” He argued that the arts don’t just provide “quality of life” in Peoria, but have economic impact as well.

Brent Lonteen, Executive Director of the Peoria Area Convention and Visitors Bureau (PACVB), explained that PACVB does not rely exclusively on city funding, but is a member-based organization. Nevertheless, they allow any arts group affilitated with ArtsPartners to utilize PACVB services because they recognize the arts community is struggling financially. He said the suggestion to combine PACVB with ArtsPartners did not originate with the bureau, but that they are willing to help in any way the city and/or ArtsPartners would request.

Manning explained that the reason for the meeting was to explore whether giving $75,000 to ArtsPartners is the best way to leverage those funds, or if there might be a better way, such as giving funding to arts groups directly. He also said there was some confusion over whether this was originally meant to be a permanent subsidy or simply seed money to get ArtsPartners established.

Spain was a strong supporter of continued funding, saying he thought the work of ArtsPartners was critical to the economic health of the community.

Several different funding ideas were suggested. One was combining ArtsPartners with the PACVB; another was to bring it under the Heartland Partnership umbrella. Another attendee suggested establishing a Public Arts Commission and funding it directly from the city budget (similar to the way the Municipal Band is funded) instead of receiving funding through HRA taxes.

The meeting lasted about an hour. ArtsPartners Executive Director Suzette Boulais attended but did not speak during the meeting. The city council will decide whether and how to continue funding ArtsPartners at their October 9 meeting.

East Bluff, North Valley, Peoria Public Schools

Neighbors spar over school sites

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Terry Larson at District 150 ForumI attended the first of four public forums hosted by District 150 last night. This one was held at Woodruff High School. The school board is trying to convince the public that they’re listening and seriously considering public input in the siting of a new school for the Woodruff attendance area.

And that is indeed “a new school” — singular. District officials said last night that there is funding to build only one new school. That school will replace Glen Oak, Kingman, and Irving primary schools, and White middle school. That covers the east bluff and the north valley, and basically sets up a scenario in which neighborhoods will be competing against each other for the new school.

Generally speaking, those who live on the bluff want the school to be up on the bluff. Those in the valley want the school to be in the valley. Some suggested putting the school near Woodruff and Lincoln schools, saying it’s the most centrally-located site for those above and below the bluff, but others insisted it would not be a good idea to mix Kindergarteners and high school seniors on the same campus.

East bluff residents are still divided between the current Glen Oak School site and the now-defunct Glen Oak Park site. Terry Larson (pictured above) presented 400 signatures from people wanting the school adjacent to the park, and several other people in attendance spoke in favor of the park site. That brought objections from other neighbors, who pointed out that the ground rules specifically stated that the Glen Oak Park site was off the table, and didn’t feel it was appropriate to be arguing for/against a site that is specifically excluded from consideration. Their complaints fell on deaf ears, however, as both the facilitator Brad McMillan and school board president David Gorenz encouraged all neighbors to speak freely on any site they wanted, claiming they wanted to “welcome all comments.”

But it soon became clear that not all comments were welcome. When people started suggesting the school board build two smaller schools (one on the bluff and one in the valley) instead of one large school, McMillan chastised the crowd, saying that they should be “realistic” since the school board had already said there is only funding to build one school. It’s unclear why he didn’t feel it equally unrealistic to suggest a site that has been officially blackballed by the park district and completely out of the school board’s control.

Those who live in the valley suggested the Morton Square Park site and the current Kingman school site.

Most people spoke off the cuff, but a few had prepared their presentations in advance. Terry Larson, whom I’ve already mentioned, was one. Another was Mike Standish, 1515 NE Perry, who put together a PowerPoint presentation with Aaron Moore advocating the Woodruff/Lincoln site. Roberta Parks spoke on behalf of the Peoria Area Chamber of Commerce and said the school board should consider sites that have “better spin-off potential” or potential for economic development around the new school, both residential and commercial. Steve Katlack, 709 E. Frye, put together a handout that advocated the current Glen Oak School site, and addressed all of the school board’s stated criteria for site selection.

The next meeting will take place at Irving Primary School on Thursday, Sept. 27. After that, there will be meetings at Von Steuben on Oct. 4 and Glen Oak on Oct. 18. A final report will be prepared by Nov. 9, which the school board will deliberate on Nov. 19. A final decision will be made by Dec. 3, and that decision will be announced on Dec. 17.