THE ASSEMBLY COZIES UP TO THE MINISTRY
Isn’t there a name for people who go to bed with others and get paid for it? Well I suppose it’s all about money after all, isn’t it? Remember the $10 million Spirit Festivals for which the Ministry would kindly instruct arts groups on how the content of their “approved” festivals could reflect the glory of the winter Olympics? The Spirit lives on! The Assembly of BC Arts Councils is making news by announcing their whole-hearted approval of Festivals Number One. Read all about it in the Globe and Mai l: “B.C. community arts groups to get $1-m for Spirit Festivals.”
If you have any doubts about who is cozy with whom, please notice the last line:
“Festival details have not yet been announced. “We are still determining what we’re going to do in the major centres,” Ms. Cadieux told the Globe.”
“What we’re going to do …”?? What ever happened to arms length?
It’s a sad day when one of our largest arts service organizations bows down to government interference in the arts.
Just to refresh your memory, here are two posts from AABC the were picked up by the Georgia Straight and elicited a lot of enthusiastic comment:
What I really think of the B.C. Spirit Festivas idea by John McLachlan.
Tom Durrie asks Assembly of B.C. Arts Councils to refuse to disperse spirit festival funding
Don’t say we didn’t tell you.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Arts AdvocacyBC, Arts AdvocacyBC. Arts AdvocacyBC said: The Assembly of BC Arts Councils sells out and jumps into bed with the Ministry. /dC3E41 Join AABC now. It's free! [...]
Tom: Interesting comment from the Minister, for sure, but perhaps it was more a turn of phrase. I’d prefer to wait to see how it all folds out before making that assumption myself.
We’ll see. I have observed however that deals with the devil rarely turn out well in the long run.
There are several questions lingering over this entire affair:
- what exactly does the government intend to do with the remaining $1.9M earmarked for “BC Spirit Festivals” in 2010-2011?
- how is it that they think they can directly organize a cultural festival of this magnitude (meaning the unspent portion, which is apparently meant for some sort of celebratory spectacle in the major metro areas) in February 2011 if they have no idea yet what they are doing?
- what is the Assembly’s position on political interference in the culture of communities? Do they value the critical function of art? How do they expect to function after a change of government, now that they have committed themselves to shoring up the BC Liberals?
- does the Assembly feel any responsibility toward its members who have chosen not to participate in BC Spirit Festivals because they object to being used as a partisan political instrument?
- why, after the BC Liberal government created — yes, created — a crisis in the authentic arts and culture organizations within our communities, did they think the best thing to do next was embark on an ill-conceived attempt to make arts organizations demonstrate their political loyalty in order to receive a pitiable amount of funding? Are they deeply stupid, seriously incompetent, or are we on the receiving end of a tantrum thrown by a small group of vindictive, petty men supported by the acquiescent silence of the rest of the government caucus?
The most serious question, however, is how we proceed now to a sensible cultural policy in this province that facilitates the best possible access to the arts regardless of income or geographic location. We are lucky to have some people in the NDP caucus who understand these issues, but to date they have neglected cultural policy in their statements. As for the Greens and the BC Conservatives, not a peep.
Hi Tom,
I’m replying to your comments wearing my hat as executive director of one of the community arts councils who recently received funding under the Spirit Festival program.
At the time of the March 2 budget I, like thousands of others in BC’s cultural community, felt that the government missed a grand opportunity to come up smelling like roses when Cabinet decided to create the Legacy fund instead of taking that $10m per year and adding it to the BCAC allocation.
But, when you’ve been around as long as you and I have, you know that funders (of all kinds and stripes) giveth and they taketh away, making these decisions according to their own strategic and yes, tactical, objectives.
I’ll say it again… yes, I hoped that the $10m per annum would have gone to the BCAC’s allocation. Given this summer’s events, $7 million was subsequently awarded to BCAC and just over a million of the remainder has now been awarded to communities around the province who can well spend those funds on a February festival.
As an FYI, I expect that many of those communities also had ties to Spirit of BC week over the few years leading up to the Olympics. Our community received modest amounts in 2007, 2008 and then $5,000 in 2009 to support festival activities during Spirit Week in February. Many communities also accessed significant Live Sites Program funding to support capital projects that would help bring communities together during the Olympics and would deliver lasting legacies after the Olympics have come and gone.
Blame the government if you will. But, I think your comments about the Assembly folks are unfair and off the mark. Our Snow King’s MasqueParade this February will be 5 years old. And every year it’s a trial of effort to raise the necessary funds that will animate a whole community to create our wonderful winter celebration. By the way, at the height of the festival, 1,000 folks of all ages gather in our Spirit Square downtown by our beautiful timberframe covered bridge. The “Spirit” square capital project is another legacy of provincial funding.
My friends will know I’m not an apologist for our present government and I think they must be in a real pickle trying to figure out what to do with the unallocated funds to date. I’ve gone into that kind of box canyon in my career too, and one can only hope that the wolves haven’t eaten your trail of bread crumbs as you try to retrace your steps. I hope they listen to the wise counsel that is available to them throughout our community.
Who knows what the next few months will hold. Myself, I hope we all continue to focus our efforts on restoring Gaming and making it an effective, dependable and transparent program. In the meantime, thousands of our good colleagues around the province are working very hard to deliver some great community arts programming – this February – and all year round. Let’s wish them well.