 Or wherever you had that bottle get it on. Yeah. Yeah, for you a little bit of that. Maybe next to the flowers. I didn't put it in that. So we'll see if the flower will get back on. Cherry? Yeah. So that's an improvement in here. You're going to sit, right? Yeah. Mike, would that work? Yep. No, no, he will be sitting here. You know, going up. How do you roll? How do you roll your pants? Okay. Michael, how close are you? I'm ready. You ready? Yeah. Sure. Yeah. All right. So, thank you everybody for coming. And welcome to the Marty Siebel Theater at the Graduate Center community. We've had a good day today so far. We had three breakout sessions in the morning on anti-racism training, space and real estate and a collective manifesto writing session that Robin will read the results of. We as an organizing cohort do not represent the DCA or the city or the official Create New York consulting team where an independent group of organizations that get a grant from the New York community trust and this effort represents our interest and support and ideas around the plan created in my seat that's being run by the DCA. Before we start I just want to take a moment to acknowledge the Lenape people upon whose land we are gathered today and we pay respect to the Lenape people and ancestors past, present and future. So thank you for everybody for coming to our small but mighty gathering and I'm going to hand things over to Diara Wright who's going to host and moderate a little bit from the Jack Performing Arts Center in Brooklyn. Okay, so good evening everyone. You're feeling well and there's a lot to be shared, said and explored I think this evening but in general with the plan for the cultural campaign so again my name is Diara Wright and I'm currently a co-director at Jack and also a mother and an educator and a dancer and so I think for like all of us there's a lot of different layers to why we're invested today there's a lot of different ways that we all invest our time into this process so this is just one layer and so I'm really excited to hear from you all and to explore together the manifestos that can also help support the process knowing that this is just the beginning of an overall process in supporting more advocacy around arts in the city on behalf of artists and arts organizations. So welcome everyone just to introduce folks who will be presenting their manifestos today so we'll have a collective manifesto that was brought together and gathered early today from a variety of perspectives. First Jennifer Fallon will speak as well Alyssa DeSousa Arpa Aviles Isa Fatima and Woody King Jr. So let's start with the collective manifesto but if you could also introduce yourself as well. Robin Chetel and I have been working in New York sort of grew up in the downtown performing arts world and evolved into somebody who does public programming. So I really am a believer in the arts bringing them to communities and providing free outdoor mostly arts programming and giving artists opportunities to create work in specific communities in interesting ways. So this morning we had a group of us who passed out for the cultural plan. So fast forward 10 years from now plans been active. These great things that you've been doing that DC's been doing or DCLA's been doing have come to fruition. So imagine the year 2027 culture is vital to New York City. The city arts and cultural map has become a rainbow of colors and shapes as diverse as its people and communities from the eastern shores of Staten and Oni Islands to the northern Benrock neighborhoods of Harlem and the Bronx from the landfill tip of the battery to the flatlands of Queens. Every parcel of every borough is thriving pulsating hotbed for artistic creativity, culture community inclusion, participation and engagement. City resources are distributed in recognition of its diversity in regards to race gender, sexual orientation age, disability status, physical health neurodiversity, class, religion national origin, marital or partnership status, ancestry political belief or activity veteran status, immigration status cultural discipline and geography. Artists are rooted in their communities. Therefore the city and private funders support affordable space for artists to live, work and present all forms of art without fear of displacement. There are ample well-paying job opportunities in the city's cultural sector for both administrative and creative roles. These include paying artists to enrich educational experiences in schools and communities. STEM education has transitioned fully to STEAM education integrating the resources of cultural organizations into both New York City's school curricular and extracurricular activities used by the stewards of culture. Recognizing that culture is present in and ideally should be coordinated with many aspects of city life. The city should establish a mayoral council chaired by the Department of Cultural Affairs of all agencies with touch on culture including city planning economic development, small business services, education, housing preservation and development, veteran services, sanitation New York City Housing Authority parks, using community development aging, homeless services, health and mental hygiene, corrections immigrant affairs, etc. and representatives of the three library systems. There is designated funding and city infrastructure that fosters intergroup collaboration between well-funded organizations and smaller ones offering robust incentives for resource sharing and administrative mentorship. The New York City Cultural Plan has made art and culture more accessible, inclusive and relevant to all audiences. The Department of Cultural Affairs promotes accessible cultural activities to both city residents and tourists throughout the city through cultural ambassadors and via a robust online portal and app through submission and outreach. Thanks to its sustaining, sustainable funding model, New York City's cultural ecosystem is the envy of the world supporting a robust, thriving and ever-expanding cultural community that serves all New Yorkers. I want a piece of that. I'll adjust in one morning. Sure. There were three or four themes that the different people had been privately wrote and there were four themes that popped up. One was diversity and diversity not just in people and shapes and sizes and colors, but diversity in diversifying like you might do a portfolio, so not just centering on Manhattan, but on all New York City and all its five boroughs in the corner. That was one thing, affordability, affordability both for people to be able to go to the arts and access the arts and affordability for artists to be able to live and work and create art here. And I can't remember, but we all had this kind of outcome of those two major ideas. What were you fighting? What were you really passionate about? We weren't fighting. We were all pretty much in agreement. I think we all realized or understood that collaboration is the key. That was the other thing. Collaboration is the key amongst artists and arts groups of all levels and also amongst people with power and the money. We're trying to put one together so that the arts was not just one thing, but really integral to all agencies working components of the city. So yeah, no point. It seems as if it just reaches the edges of what a lot of people would think of as culture. And it really embraces all of those things. We all talk about art and culture, but what really is that? So we're talking about cultures which has come out in a lot of these meetings I'm into. Culture, arts, as we know it traditionally, or is it people and is it the food and is it the shops and is it bodegas and is it all of that but they all come together to create New York City's cultural background. I think that's where the misunderstanding is coming when you're dealing with government. There's a misunderstanding of what culture is when you're dealing with government and the cultural idea of what that's supposed to look like. And this is a broad idea and a factual and a realistic idea of what it is. Thank you so much. I think what you're saying about the key seed of collaboration being a part of one of the greatest takeaways is definitely a supportive thing for the planet itself. It's a model of collaboration that can really translate to the planet or be further for the planet. So in transitioning to the next manifesto for another voice from Jennifer Falu you would give us more information about yourself as well and share with us your manifesto. My name is Jennifer Falu most people just call me Falu often. I am a big performer. I have been writing since I was 14. I went to high school in the Virgin Islands in St. Croix and my English teacher decided that she was going to put me in college English in ninth grade and I discovered my level of writing through AP English and watching a poet by the name of Jessica Cairmore on the Apollo. She looked like me she had grades and she did this poem called Black Girl Juice and I knew that is what I wanted to do. I wanted to do that. And that is also where I discovered that poem to not have to rhyme but another story. So I've been kind of doing this work of being a teaching artist and going throughout New York City schools since I was about 19. I'm 33 now. I was working at the food sample office. My mom had gotten me my first job at a food sample office. I had just had a child and I was absolutely 150 percent miserable. And my English teacher who was here who was also my grandmother's mentee at my grandmother was the head of the English department at Boy and Girl's High School. She was running the mega-episcogenetic program and she said, oh you could come in every Friday and just teach a gorgeous class every Friday. And I was 19 and they were like 16. So weird, so we were friends. It was weird friends. And from then on I decided this is the work that I want to do and I'm going to commit my life to the use of New York City and of course it branched out into other places but for the most part I am primarily New York City based. I did that for a couple of years and then I decided alright so I'm going to go out on a whim and I'm going to quit my job my trusty bi-weekly paycheck at the food sample and I'm going to do this work full time and I've been doing this work full time since I was about 23 and I went to my pastor and he said listen you can't make it doing what you love to do but I think you should be doing it. So I think you can do it. And I've been doing it ever since. So Brad invited me here because last week I did was it last week? Last week we did a performance and we just had a Q&A and a talk back and one of the questions the moderator asked was how do you choose in the sea of noise what your work is of what you want to do and one of the things I was talking about was I had an opportunity to do a poem at the Women's March and I turned it down because my students were having a school-wide trip all of science and you have to just choose what's important to you and I think to be committed to them and to know and to let them know and remind them that they are important is pretty much the greatest thing in the world. So I wrote down a couple of notes but I feel like we're so informal that we can just talk at this point, right? So I just wrote down a couple of things and so when we talk about commitment to youth, right? The actual work commitment is to find the two ways. The first way is the state of quality of being dedicated to a cause or activity. The second one is an engagement or obligation that restricts freedom of action, right? So definition one feels like a choice. Like I decided that this is the work that I want to do and it's always fun and definition two kind of feels like a chore. A restricting freedom of an action. Almost like a chore. When you wake up in the morning and your mother says, listen, dishes. You forgot to do them last night. Definition one makes me feel like my students behave all the time and it makes it easy for me to like them. And definition two feels like it's my only day off and I'm sleeping and it's the true story. And old Navy has called me and said I need to come pick up so and so because she stole and if I don't come pick her up I stay in my bed because it's my day off and I'm not her mother or do I go and pick her up. Commitment is you get up out of bed and you go and pick her up. And so it's it's really the difference between what you feel is dedication and what you feel like is an obligation, right? Or um what you feel like is a choice versus what you feel like is like this burden that you have. So I have very simple kind of rules as to how I could make to my students and I'm just going to share them with you. You're good. First thing for me got to get you some big homies. Right? Big homies who are your mentors, your friends, your teachers um and they are committed kind of to a field that you're committed to and they watch over you for years. It's folks that have been committed to you who are listening here for you who are not afraid of you because committing as a teacher or as a mentor or whatever the title is should not make you a perfect approach. Should not make it so you feel like you are the end of the year. My second rule is always and I spoke about it just to choose what is important to you which is like the difference between possibly being on TV and getting a big paycheck and not getting a paycheck. Um my third rule is to not expect a paycheck when you're committed to you you can't you can't be in this field and think that it's going to pay for everything that you have. Um I can't even tell you how much money I've spent, how much snacks how many school trips I've gone on and so and so you know we provide lunch and they don't want to eat the lunch and I've given up my lunch um it's just one of those things where you take money out of your pocket and you have to not expect money in return or you are really really in the wrong field and again that's the difference between like really being committed to children and not being committed to children. Um the next rule I always have in being committed to them is to ask for help if I'm overwhelmed this is a hard job um being around kids is a hard job sometimes it's a thankless job more times than not it's a thankless job um people's parents want you to have certain boundaries and kids do not want to have those boundaries with you so my students know they have certain rules like don't touch my hair without permission things like you know but it teaches personal space um having a balance for me is super important because I have children of my own I have two children of my own one of which is in high school she's 15 so I have 6, 7 and 8th grade daily basis and then I go home and have a 6 year old so one of the ways that I found balance in my personal life and still being able to be committed to my regular students my daily students is I take my kids to work um I give my kid a job at my job so if um so and so needs to go to the bathroom my daughter is the person it's her internship my daughter is the person who takes them to the bathroom that way I get to spend time with my kids um I get to teach my kids responsibility I get to teach my students that just because someone is the same age as you doesn't need or a little bit older doesn't mean that they don't deserve respect and that they cannot be in a position of authority because at some point when you get to 8th grade and April is in 6th grade you get to kind of walk her to the bathroom and she should be able to say respectfully and listen to you as well so that's one of the ways I find balance um during the summer because in the fall we have fall program we have spring program and then we transition into summer program and in the summer I bring all my kids to work I bring everybody the 6 year old the 9 year old the 15 year old everybody comes to work because it's a summer camp and the 6 year old and the 9 year old participate in regular everyday program and then the 15 year old again she works as an intern did I run out of time yet? I did but that's what I do that's how I'm committed hopefully it's something that you guys can use in um yes, work is life thanks guys thank you excellent I also take my son to work we're just many places and almost was here tonight but that's a part of it right how does the culture we are like work and how can we support each other and that and how can the city community institutions say that too as well thank you Jennifer next Alyssa D'Souza if you could share a bit more about New York what you're bringing today as well as the manifesto so hi my name is Alyssa D'Souza I'm studying public policy and political science at Hunter College I'm also the vice chair for senior colleges at CUNY so on behalf of all of our students I want to thank you guys here today to welcome you here but welcome and I'm really excited to engage in discussion tonight especially for people who are stakeholders in this discussion and in this especially students and it really exhilarates me that we have this opportunity to share our diverse experiences and viewpoints especially of students like I was saying and so our federal government right now has made it clear that the arts are not only important to them but rather unworthy of any funding at all the proposed budget cuts eliminates four cultural agencies eliminating their budget to zero the communities that would be impacted most by these unprecedented cuts are poor and rural and poor and rural ones about 25% of NEA block grants funds go to rural communities and 53% to low income areas it is evident that at this time our arts the way that we express our individuality and embrace our diversity is under attack this is why discussions of this nature are so vital at this time so I'm a political science student and a creator in my own way I like to draw, I like to paint and I like to design art and culture run through the veins of all of our disciplines and we need more of an incorporation of these various disciplines in the arts viewing different fields of study through the lenses of arts and culture allow us to see them through a different light and appreciate them more deeply it was just a few weeks ago that I found myself opening up my mind at the Cooper Hewitt Museum when an interactive exhibit allowed me to solve community issues through design and policy we need expansion of urban spaces for all artists from all walks of life to create and collaborate with each other and these spaces must be accessible by public transportation to all these facilities could be multi-use where artists who work over different mediums could create a space together and perhaps influence each other in a positive way often young people are discouraged from entering arts fields this is why mentoring is important parents seasoned artists who have experience in their own networks with young, brash minds who have innovative ideas for the future would lend them invaluable insight and perhaps the inspiration and motivation to delve deeper deeper into the field further, a dilemma that often faces students is between taking an unpaid internships in arts programs or taking a second or even third job because they simply cannot afford to work not to work while students in finance or business may acquire paid internships students in these art fields often find themselves having to make this difficult choice interning can prepare students for their field and give them insight that only experiential learning opportunities can offer this is why we would like to see an increase in paid internships or even stipends for internships further, we need to see an investment into students' future through the form of scholarships for students pursuing arts degrees this past week I had the opportunity to chat with a friend who was pursuing a degree in visual arts and media she expressed to me that she might have to drop her major while she was in school because supplies for her classes cost over $500 per semester and she wasn't sure how much longer she would be able to continue purchasing materials at such a high rate although she has since graduated successfully there are many other students in the same situation investing in these students and increasing aid for them will allow not only to pursue an arts degree but also complete their courses without worrying about whether they could buy supplies of their classes that should impact their grades or groceries to adjust a few of the issues in which this funding could be utilized to serve our community it is through the arts that we express our humanity and embrace our diversity I'm so thankful that we're here discussing investment which is much needed in arts and culture around our city thank you guys so much for having me and encouraging others from the community to speak up and express your own views and I really look forward to the improvements that this initiative is going to have thank you so yeah already there seems to be a thread of arts being an opportunity for more development and growth between people and you know just really getting to an idea of what does it mean to sense of art and think of it as an economy in itself and important to our overall economy and helping to for students and young people to develop with that value and support so thank you for that so Arthur Abiles please share with us more about who and okay so I'm just written by Charles Rice Gonzalez who is the executive director of space so hello everybody my name is Arthur Abiles I'm the co-founder and artistic director of BAD the Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance so some of you will be happy to know he James Baldwin quotes in this speech so I have carved out a space for dance and the arts along with Charles Rice Gonzalez he's a writer and a Bronx activist with help of many artists and supporters BAD is one of two standalone year round theaters in a borough that's still even with the onset of gentrification holds the poorest congressional district 1.4 million people and only two freestanding theaters in the Bronx so I mention this because for many years we have worked relentlessly to keep this space vibrant and alive for everybody and in keeping with our mission statement especially women, people of color and lesbian, gay, transgender bisexual, too spirited in the life queer questioning and curious communities and so if you have any more give them a hug so I was just going to say that I know that people are using the abbreviation LGBTQ and that's common now but we need to get to saying these names out loud we need to know that we are still not that common even though social media and television will make us think differently but when you're living in communities like mine LGBTQ doesn't cut it we need to really say what this is our mission statement sounds more like a social justice organization because from our very start over 18 years ago we believed in the hyperlocal and we believe in the Bronx and beyond it matters to us who we attract who make up our audiences and who are our artists in a time when New York City is being proactive about the arts with this cultural plan the federal government demolishing the support for the arts and humanities we now we know that we need to do more we need more performances we need to support more artists fortified theaters with long range plans as sustainable spaces keep the lights on brightly and our doors open wide bad and our art was described by the New York Times as having the tenacity of grass growing through concrete so we are good at being tenacious but we also have to be strategic if we are going to thrive by strategic I mean financially strategic strategic with partnerships and strategies to whether actions aimed to make us extinct the Bronx also has a history of persevering so come on people the largest worldwide cultural export from New York City to Bangladesh with very little argument was born right in the Boogie Down Bronx it's happening right now when the Bronx was burning till now some will say the Bronx is still burning at the moment and justification is still on its way we haven't held out since the 1970s Brooklyn broke we held out so back in the day when I grew up you know to wrap meant to have a conversation so when you were wrapping with someone you were having a conversation with that so words matter never meant to go in one direction so recognize revolutionize so who will stand with us to keep a stage a platform a show to show the world how to navigate through these times who will have the courage to fund art that is challenging who will rise with bad because they understand and value what dance has to offer what art has to offer what the Bronx has to offer the current president and his administration is an enemy to the core values of this country and particularly to the arts so James Baldwin said a nuanced ally with power is the most ferocious enemy justice can have so some are saying that this is a dark time that the president will whittle away at the conscience of society in an attempt to exhaust us we are not having that we say no to obscurity Baldwin also said the precise role of the artist then is to illuminate that darkness blaze roads through that vast forest so that we will not in all our doing lose sight of its purpose after all to make the world a more humane dwelling place so before the darkness we can take hold the Bronx will create and shine to make this world a more human dwelling place bad has stood face to face with homophobia, sexism racism and many other social ills we have resisted with dance and art and persisted with dance and art so I envision a more powerful Bronx with more than two independent year round theaters a Bronx that keeps financially accessible living spaces for its artists and its residents for bad envisions a larger visible shiny bustling dance center to support generations of creators for 18 years we have been artists and presenters of artists who have been agents of change Bronx writer asked can artists change the world I'm not sure but art can make people feel and if you can make them feel then the possibility for change exists so let's face the present let's face the future too because Baldwin always also says not everything that is faced can be changed but nothing can be changed until it is faced so we are the Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance and we will continue to be bad thank you very much thank you so much hearing a lot of what you've presented the the exclamation of the importance of activism in the arts and this idea of very qualities that make the Bronx as well as New York City a model for the country of how to nourish culture or nourish the new or the first things that come out and become exports how to be as a city to stay important in that role really setting a tone for what the country of the world could see as what's next and what's a part of humanity so I thank you so much for your manifesto and your work of 18 years thank you thank you so much so Iza Fatima welcome and give us a bit more about yourself and your manifesto please cool so my name is Iza Fatima writer and actor and I'm also the presenter I've done so many different sort of festivals that have been more geared around South Asian Middle Eastern performers and writers so we did the inaugural South Asian International Performing Arts Festival two years ago here in Manhattan I was one of the co-founders of that but you know when Brad reached out to me a few last week about this and I was in a really funky situation and I can't really talk too much about that so I won't really get into all of it but you can google it NPR ran a story on a series of plays that I had written with Muslim protagonist that were supposed to go up in various places and these are children's musicals and I just wrote the book for one and collaborated on the other ones with some other artists with the Brooklyn Children's Theater I'll let you guys google this story so which is not a great thing and then just as an artist when you first reached out to me I was like well I would love to live in a world where I actually get paid when I get to do theater a living wage so it's not constantly this struggle between do I take this theater gig or do I have keep a job that might actually pay me real life but that's a conversation for another day I think that is not part of my manifesto today today I think I would really like to talk about an arts and culture community that is inclusive and representative and by inclusive and representative I might not mean what you think I mean so I'm really grateful for being here I'm really grateful for being invited here and I'm also all about tokenism and I love getting into rooms around the token brown the female or the Muslim art whatever whatever I check a lot of boxes it's great but unless tokenism really truly leads to something more we're never going to be able to fix a problem we're never going to have an arts and cultural community that is truly representative and truly inclusive so just about that something you said about watching this black brown girl with the braids and talking about her experience on a TV on Apollo and that really spoke to you so when I was growing up I knew at the age of 13 I saw a play and I was like oh my god I want to do that someday move people that way make them cry and laugh and learn something about the world and the play was about it's called A Thousand Cranes about the bombings that happened in Japan during World War II and this little girl that dies years later from the effects of chemotherapy so it was really good but I did not have the vocabulary and thoughts to be like oh I could do that I could be that person who could be on that stage and to be honest I didn't even realize that until just a few years ago I was talking to a friend they were like well you know you've had this strange career path into acting you went to school for microbiology then a dual degree in computer information systems then I worked at Google for a little while and then I was like oh you're not going to act something like that it's the abbreviated version of my life but that's basically how it went why didn't you just go into it when you were younger I was like to be honest I didn't think it was for me I never saw a single person who looked like me on a stage on TV in a film so I really didn't think that was a viable career option for me but that's representation right we need to see our stories on stage but it goes beyond that so it's not just on stage it's also behind the scenes of people who have lived through these experiences telling these stories it's just somebody's idea of what this character looks like or what this person's life might look like and it's never a realistic portrayal of a three dimensional person I'll give you an example so just recently I've had opportunities to work with you know a workshop of a play with like Broadway stars I mean amazing people and I'm so grateful to be in that room I found another play where I worked on it was a lovely play by a very accomplished American writer so two different plays and they both portray a Jewish family and a Middle Eastern family interestingly enough and in the first play the Middle Eastern family and the father is very mad at the family all the time and his relationship with the wife is very it's not a very fun relationship the couple, the white couple they're just like oh I love you honey oh I love you too and you're going through this dramatic thing but we're gonna be okay and we're gonna pull through kissy kissy huggy huggy and then it comes to the Middle Eastern people and they're just like I can't even explain it and so I'm like well that's not realistic you know I mean in my life the Middle Eastern people I know yes they may fight couples but they also make up and they're also very loving and then again the other play which was a very different play said in Israel so it was an Israeli family and a Palestinian family again the Israeli family is hilarious the little girl is like a raging lesbian and the mom is so afraid of the L word it's hilarious immediate conflict and then the Palestinian family is like yes my brother died and then my father died and then they bulldozed my whole entire house and they murdered it so again these two dimensional kind of people so when I bring up all of this to kind of bring in my own personal experience and to speak from that place because I think that's the only place I can really speak from it's great to paint these rosy pictures of I want to have a great big diverse cultural you know New York but I think I want to also concentrate on the very practical things I can do so for me when you write white people when you're out there writing these characters and you're writing Middle Eastern or South Asian or Muslim American characters hey call me if I can't help you out with these characters I'll find a friend who can who's also a writer it's great that you want to write about these characters but just also make sure that you are truly inclusive and if you are an established playwright amazing great for you bring up somebody who's not as established as these communities work with this person mentor this young person and you know create work together perhaps that's what the future looks like for us so we can truly have representation and truly be inclusive thank you I appreciate framing inclusiveness and representation as a process and being mindful and challenging everyone if we can give attention to the process who in developing this work wears the accountability in this process and if we as a community can become a part of that that's a shift that is more immediate as well for a lot of us to see and to reflect that so I appreciate that thank you so Woody King Jr welcome sir and please share with us more about yourself and what you have to say today okay about a week ago Brad Kang two weeks ago he had been conducting a panel and one of the cultural leaders Hispanic lady felt that they had been ignored in the process so in that process she talked about I think she stormed out because no one in the room looked like her and spoke at all so I think that is why I am here being a person who the people I work with knew Brad and knew I knew the people who ran the living theater especially Judith and so I started thinking when he said come and speak your sure what happens is whether this is a cultural zone that they are talking about putting together or a cultural district they are thinking about doing it follows up on Tom Fickle Pearl's long survey but in the midst of that survey political changes happen in America those political changes don't care about that survey if they knock out the National Endowment for the Arts if they knock out the National Endowment for the Humanities then the large museums in America the large theaters in America the large educational institutions in America are going to survive and what is trickled down will come to African American theaters Hispanic theaters Hispanic dance companies Asian companies it will be so low until it will be impossible to survive you spoke about the two institutions that are there in the Bronx your company that's what you're talking about and Rosalvo Salone so who are the I think she should be at some of these meetings Maiye should be here to cover what you were talking about and I think the difficulties are whether you're in St. Croix growing up I don't know if you saw in the productions we brought there to the in the theater outdoors and all that during the 90s in 2000 we were always in St. Croix I was able to recruit some of the most wealthy people in the islands the Jones who came to America and really their political powers in the islands and I think you spoke about Jessica Kiermour ironically she's from Detroit and I'm from Detroit what happens is Jessica Kiermour is a poet who could get published Jessica Kiermour is a poet who said wait a minute I could put 75 pages together and sell them out of the back of my car and did it on our own Maiye said wait a minute I am tired in the East West play I'm tired of trying to get my plays done so we're going to start an organization that organization now is probably one of the better and professional organizations in New York the East West players follow up you know Rousseau Colom does so much in the Bronx and really accepts so many people now the Department of Cultural Affairs got to support these kind of organizations who really have brilliant dancers, brilliant artists but they can't survive on what they're getting paid to start there I'm sure you want to bring in some of the top dancers in the world they can't afford to come and work for you because quite institutions get top money from DCA you will luck if you get 35,000 you will lucky if you get 25,000 you will lucky three and you can't even pay the rent with that so Tom Finkipurl I think wanted these hearings to assist him and going to the City Council and all those other places for far more funds in order to do far more things in cultural district, cultural zones I don't know if you know downtown Brooklyn is a cultural district now you know the Broadway Theater District is a cultural district Manetti's Festival of Two Worlds are in a square that's a cultural zone in that zone there's American restaurant there's an Italian restaurant there's places that sell hats I don't know if you've been to Italy in that small that small is a diversity of cultures and those three auditoriums that's there present some of the most outstanding work in the world it brings these people from everywhere anywhere there is art culture the producing of new works whatever and people come in you gotta have a new restaurant you gotta have someone's gonna say wow I make clothes I want people to understand the different cultures and the different kind of clothes I make beautiful hats you know they're gonna have that hat you're gonna buy that hat so in LA there's something called the Lambert Park Cultural Center there's a bookstore there's a theater presenting there's a large space for large touring shows across the street there's a jazz place that plays jazz on the corner the twins have a coffee shop it's like all of a sudden now in the wake of what everything in LA is going through there's a cultural zone a district and a cultural zone is two different things if you go anywhere near uh Pergonius you know they gotta get parking you know you gotta find it it's hard to park you know there's too many people coming in there and very soon the grand concourse is gonna have to find a way to not ticketing everybody who and they know they're in their cultural space so wow it's so amazing that um talk to me man I was sitting there and I said wow this young guy man Judith Melina a pioneer I don't know if you all know Judith Melina the different theater the founders who made all this happen when the village was in a slum on 14th Street another slum on 6th Avenue you know I mean it created some of the most important works the New York theater has seen the bridge the connection all these things that made us wow man I mean Detroit I gotta go to New York you know it's like amazing you know and also being able to take those works all over the world and that's what New Federal Theater did and does I mean we'll be a Bermuda we'll be in St. Croix, St. Thomas doing a play we'll be in Pan-African Festival in Ghana I wouldn't advise anybody to go you would never get paid it would be hard to get out of the country you know I'm sure you all went through that so you know what I'm saying but it's uh we were invited these festivals happen all of your art can be seen now can make a living at our theater because the funders DCA and all the other funders do not see people of color in the same light as they see white artists a lot of white artists I mean they realize oh wow you going to Lincoln Center you gotta make a thousand dollars a week cause he has to pay his rent he has to feed his family no no no the people at New Federal people that are gone I'm sure you can give them a stipend you give them 25 dollars a performance they'll find a way to live another way so anyway with that I was wondering how many people here are funded by DCA and do you feel that funding is I don't know is equal to what the art you're doing and if not what can be done in setting up these zones to make it a pair of a suit with what you're doing that's a great transition I think to just an open discussion but first thank you for your context and broad experience that you brought into the room right now and it's extremely important to root the conversation moving forward so thank you for that so I think if we wanted to open up now and Brad if there's another way you want to start let me know that's a great strategy I think it's really important so maybe to reframe the question a bit what does it really look like to have a funding model that reflects an investment in all people who are bringing money to the city bringing a sense of identity to what New York City feels like and how people experience the city bringing taking the New York City brand or the Brooklyn brand or the Bronx or whatever and the export factor right to what how can what could be a model or recommendations to really create tangible equity in funding model a way that the process is approached do people have thoughts about that and you can also speak from your experience of what you asked around you know the funding you might have received through DCA doesn't really reflect your time and effort well there's this effort in our area was just a squatter area to create a cultural district connected with what you were saying there and I feel like I don't really know what the channels are in order to really make that happen but it's through the business improvement district the businesses in that area they have a kind of organization that is connected with the businesses and they want to turn it into a kind of cultural district but there's bad there's this small drawing place they do life drawings and things like that over there and then what else is there I mean you think about if you're going to turn it into a cultural district what do we have in order to make that happen and how do we how we can make that happen you know what does that mean does it mean like the trains use Westchester Square as an express stop rather than passing it all the time passing it all the time is unfortunate for our space especially at certain times you know what has to change in that so I'm just putting all that out there great so then in front of you there's a question too potentially for recommendations who decides what a cultural district is what is the holistic vision for it what are the parts and who's a part of that process I think is important and it's true if it's not being thought of in a way that you know have you been talked to about this new definition right and then by who yeah I mean it's something that's new right now so I'm just thinking about that right now yeah I want to just jump in and introduce myself I'm Karen I'm a natural referring cultural district New York and we're a partner on the planning process and this discussion of cultural districts makes me feel like I want to speak up because we started because we felt like cultural districts were really often with a top-down perspective that was definitely the thing that's proposing this we're like thinking like there's nothing here and so let's bring something here and of course there's something there and so we came together as different groups and communities saying there are already cultural districts in the places you're trying to create cultural districts which should be happening is recognizing what's there and strengthening it and at the same time recognizing that there's some policy benefits that you can garner so the Fourth Arts Block for example is a cultural district and has been able to protect that the spaces on that block and keep them affordable by allowing them some housing activists so like how can you use how can you strengthen organic districts and allow them with organizing to stave off displacement as opposed to the other model which is top-down cultural districts that enhance displacement so that's something that we're trying to deal with are you looking at only New York City or are you looking at all the Queens, Brooklyn naturally or the cultural plan no, naturally the cultural plan I would say we're primarily not Manhattan but you are a city organization not a state or national, you're not worried about cultural districts in North Carolina grassroots organization that can't even apply for DCA funding because we use a fiscal sponsor so we're basically a network of networks and so most of our members are C3 organizations we don't want to compete with them and really we came together to organize to promote policy issues and then we made the decision which is an interesting one for us to collaborate on the cultural plan because we felt pretty strongly about wanting it to reach out in Manhattan and so that's what we're trying to do in our participation in it do we understand what the cultural plan is it sounded kind of abstract do you want to say something about that? I'm happy to I'm not the Department of Cultural Affairs what is the cultural plan so the cultural plan New York City has never had a cultural plan so the reason that one thing about a plan and putting things down on paper is there's been a lot of de facto policies we all know that there's lots of policies and ways that the city's done business but it hasn't had to state them publicly and so the reason we got involved is we think it's important to have things down paper whether you agree or disagree with it because then you can agree or disagree with it you can organize around it we also you know hope because of the of the way the de Blasio administration has talked about equity then it's a moment when you can write a plan that hopefully will put equity as a key principle in it and you know we'll see if it has there's a lot of forces that play around the plan but what the plan is is it's a set of issue areas it's a set of short-term and long-term policy proposals and program proposals it is not an allocation of money so that's another story so a plan is a way then to fight for the resources to put it into action so you know there will be a plan and then you know the timing is difficult because the plan comes out and sometimes the budget comes out so it will be a set of aspirations for the next budget fight and the draft of the plan comes out at the end of next month so we'll actually know there'll be recommendations coming out in the middle of May it looks like now I think the one other thing that I would put out about the plan because everyone's talking about UCLA and I think they are they're the ones putting it out but I think another opportunity around the plan is to say that the arts are more important than to be funded by one agency and it's a chance to really promote the idea that other city agencies take the arts seriously enough to invest in them as well so I know that the department, you were saying that the department of cultural affairs will use this as a way to try to get more money one of the ways they're trying to do that is by connecting with other city agencies to leverage other money and but from my point of view none of that's going to happen if it's just the department of cultural affairs doing it, it's got to be all of us it's the whole accountability thing once the plan is out saying okay I like this, how do you make that happen or I don't like this, how do we change it can we help them in any kind of way go to the other departments to get funded to assist them in whatever they want to do I think this is part of that you know in the collective manifesto that was read earlier one of the main points that they talked about I know one of the people that participated in that writing is somebody who has a lot of knowledge of the different agencies and made that a key point in their writing this morning to say we need to link all these agencies and I think what the DCA has said at meetings so far just in my reporting what I've seen is that they need residents they need citizens of the city in the same way that they support anything education libraries you know when the library there's been a great example made of the libraries and how good they are at incorporating community support when the libraries have a hearing parents and kids show up in color coordinated t-shirts and scream and yell and hooten holler the library has got $350 million under written last year you know when we hold hearings the same group show up you know and this is what happens a lot of that is because people are exhausted or don't know that they have the power to advocate for the arts hopefully my intention and the people that we called here today was to have people sort of just lay some stuff out there that would be helpful to motivate people that see this video after we were after we put it out on howl around and and whatever we can you know maybe now you and Karen can talk about the Bronx if you're not already you know like is this gathering a part of what our problem is I mean I saw this advertised tonight on so many different places I got emails about it I saw it on Facebook I expected to be sitting in the back of the room behind 200 people tonight and you know our own people don't want to show up to things like this when this is probably the most critical time the arts has faced since 96 in the NEA4 and we can't even get our own people to come out to something like this we're certainly not going to get them to bring their kids in colored shirts to some era I mean do we have a problem within ourselves and that it's rather than confront that problem it's easier for us to call for a cultural plan and have politicians I think it's a good question I think it's a very good question I mean I don't know if we have an answer but I think one way to kind of fight that is in this digital age it's easy to you have a video cut a two minute version of this let's put it out to all of our networks to make sure that people understand hey here's a link, go here here's a next meeting, come and vote come and discuss, come and whatever that next call to action is I think get the word out there even though I went to the facebook page and I was invited to be a guest speaker I still quite didn't understand what this was sorry that's on me too but I would have taken the day off to come earlier today but I could not get a sense of what you know I needed to know more to take the day off absolutely and that's on us to get the exactly also I think that we're in a different time to this is the age of social media people really receive their information through that and I think that there's fairness there to be physical in a room and to also receiving information whether you received physically or you receive it through that medium that's a lot of what's going on is there a way to see how many people watch this on home run? we should have a see how around has an unbelievable power no I think I'm certainly a lot of meetings are actually happening perhaps too many on the other end this is a process perhaps it hasn't been kept for the last 20 years basically so it's a restart it's a reboot which is a very good sign I think it takes a while I'm here at the University, I'm on the seat of theater center and we have a problem getting students involved into things because there hasn't been a culture of protest on the university as a place the arts are no longer used to talk about this as much as we often accuse politicians you have lost the connection to the people or maybe also arts, theater why aren't people coming? we should have that is a valid point but I see this as a great moment to re-engage, to start talking about the arts, about politics and so it's a little bit more clear in Jersey which I like, my wife is American was in Canada talking about politics and religion, never at a different level she's not joking, it's so you can and that was me, in front of me and I'm European and the guys work with me I don't work in business, I don't work in show business but anyway, now people talk about it neighbors on the streets trained on the bus, so something is changing I think this evening is part of it but it is different but it's important that we have meetings face-to-face in rooms and get out symbolically, Michael will come together something and it's a process and it's a step after step after step, even a marathon starts with first steps so this is why I think this is a great initiative by the volunteers to create a plan, everybody who works with the shadows to put this together and to reconnect and so I think hopefully not so many here, but as far as I know in the last 10 years, I don't know if any of these meetings have happened, maybe you know what I would say is there I think a lot of, I'm part of something called get organized Brooklyn and at each meeting we have among more and more artists are coming in wanting to do something I think part of it is people are going to a lot of meetings right now there's a lot of reasons and not just about art, but about everything that's going on in the world people who are organizing are organizing and artists are getting involved in politics and a lot of things so I think there might be how many meetings can you go to in a week or five and I think it's hard to wrap your brain around the idea of a cultural plan I think it's easier to wrap your brain around save the NEA and there's some meetings coming up around that there's going to be a demonstration outside of city hall there's going to be a hearing I think that's packed the thing about the cultural plan is I'm so tired of fighting against things I want to be for something and a cultural plan as abstract as it is allows you to say what you want and what you're for if we live in a progressive city I hope and what should a progressive policy be around art and culture and that's the question that the plans are asking so I think we need to think of how to ask the question in a way that's more interesting and exciting to people but I think it is something that people want to weigh in on I think it's a proactive movement a spark of maybe more proactive artist advocacy in general versus like you're saying more reactive resist this stuff that which is also needed I think pressure from all the directions from within proactive and reactive are needed but I think when things feel dire and time is limited for people they do choose do I take this step and do this and potentially lose my health care in six months or any closing or do I stay engaged in this process that feels like a longer a little you know not so much of an instant gratification but a longer process a longer point to really stay engaged as far as accountability because there's all these things around the plan around you know a few years down the road it's reviewed reassessed and then it goes back out again and people really maybe not being clear about how they're how their contribution will be applied and affect their daily lives I think is also a challenge to it and there's I mean like you said there's also other meetings that have happened that have had great turnout I tell you what and you can ask these guys I'm Mr. Meeting when it comes to theater and I've been one of the few people in a room whether it's the League of Independent Theater political thing a couple of weeks ago or last month or like 12 people there I was expecting like 50 I mean I really thought people were going to come out for that I mean I've been one of a dozen people in meetings for decades now so I mean we can talk about what might show up to the any a protest personally it's it to or something in the afternoon on a weekday I won't be there I have a job you know but we can talk about whether or not people show up in the future because that always sounds good but when I look in the past I'm not seeing more and more people show up and I worry that maybe we're not being bold enough in what we're doing and I'm sorry I feel very Artidian or very Reverend Billy about it right now but I personally think we should advocate for the end of the any a you know I think that that would be a very good thing for my organization because when you look at New York City in theater specifically we've got Broadway which does not get any a grants and we've got the people in my world which do not get any a grants any a was established to bring theater out to the rest of the world if they in the any a they will cut off theater in Detroit in Pennsylvania in you know Kansas or Kentucky or wherever else that's where the any month any a money would dry up if they ended it not in New York I don't know you may have gotten any a grant I don't know if you've gotten any a grant I've been doing this for 30 years I can't even get through the damn application but what are we losing if we lose the any a it's not that much money to begin with well what happens is if they cut money out of say Detroit the millionaires who support theaters around America that in Detroit Netherlands they're now going to save the Detroit Institute of Art there will be no money for any of us in New York and that is nothing from nothing still nothing no no I wasn't here to begin with but the 30 pages for any a if you've done two or three you can do five or six or seven there is you know also it what the dilemma is what the fear is it becomes that any a says you got a grant now do the program and send us the receipts and we'll give it to you that's the fear because artists are not going to wait seven months or eight months to get paid they're not going to do that that's the problem with any a and a lot of times DCA will give you money and they'll only you can only borrow 80% of it and you still don't have enough to deal with it you can borrow 80% now but the project is on course what DCA gives you plus the match it's also a matter of principle for the country you know in thinking that maybe we need to be a part of the creation of art it might not be a lot of money it has something to do with responsibility and us chipping in and why wouldn't we do that why wouldn't our country do that so that's just kind of a weird thing about our country well in the history of the NEA was peer panels and the respect for knowledge in the field and especially in the theater field there's a long history of the panels for the theater panels really shifting away from funding large white theaters and really looking at who is in need for public funding and I think it's been a really beneficial thing and I agree with you it's terribly hard to get the money but when I looked at the groups I'm sure that the NEA was critical for them and I think for a lot of theaters of their size not only was NEA important to them but that Rosalba and Alban had a voice in the criteria and the guidelines of the NEA in a way you don't in a part of the foundation I just wonder if maybe it's the responsibility of the fly over cities to fight for the NEA at least in terms of theater but my point is really that maybe we need some bolder language maybe it's not let's end the NEA but does anybody have any idea I mean the fact that you have to ask what is this cultural plan that to me is a sign that it's so watered down the idea of developing something like this that I'm not even sure why we're spending all this much time on it I know NYFA, New York Foundation for the Arts, spent like a year and a half doing something like this they published it with big fanfare the week before 9-11 and we never heard about it again because all of a sudden when we're being attacked we get lower and lower on the list but the idea that we're just not talking in bold terms anymore we're coming up with a plan that's going to solve anything what frightened me is her overview and when she said looking down the road 10 years this is what we envision I can't look down the road 10 years I have to deal with the here and now I have to deal with paying people here and now I have to deal with you know I was in the New York Shakespeare Festival office and that development team was 26 people and I was like whoa I got two people doing all this and they got 26 people going after money yeah yeah and I said so DCA I hope they will make our application process a lot easier well I think this certainly is one of the points that always come that should be easier I think we don't really know what the cultural violence because there hasn't been one it's unfortunate perhaps but if they have to start somewhere I think it's good that we try to talk about it you don't know because nobody knows but I think it is a to admire the big cultural commissioner now let's try to do the impossible because it is impossible New York is like the internet it's too big nobody knows anything any opinion you have another one comes out I think it's a great bold and courageous thing to try to get the plan to be around we should try to support it and it is in a way like in Athens and Greece what art should it be perhaps at the time of the Romans when they had the terrible Colosseums and the time of the Mozart what is art or Paris or Berlin what is it good for I think it's a good thing and I think the efforts are sincere and I think people do understand that they touch many more departments and maybe this is a good thing that will come out NEA is way too little I think it has 140 out of 50 million just in university research science get 60 billion dollars a year so it's already nothing in a way that the hope is to understand that this is a significant contribution in the future in the world where there will be robots there will be 30% of all jobs will be lost perhaps in 10 to 15 years and that the access to culture and health education is a fundamental human right and I think they will become more important than before and to do good theater and people will actually come and meet I think two life events so it's a great thing that they are asking for and maybe it will take 10 years of course it can be done in 3 months it's impossible but it's a great thing that there is a start and that people are involved in it and I think it's all making contribution and you have a feeling at least from our intention but when it's listening people really are interested to know and get and collect and I think this is a fantastic thing and I think also this day is a testimony to it because otherwise we wouldn't do it and maybe it's about to the DCA becoming clear about how they are going to share the short term goals that come out of plans there will be the trajectory of okay there is the 5 year, the 10 year etc but what are those immediate recommendations that people can get behind in those first few years that they can really say okay if we push for A, B and C to happen by 2020 and these are the ways that we can hold person, E, F, G accountable to that happening and making those pathways clear so people know where to put their energies and know where to really happen to as a community I think once people start to feel change and feel some actual adjustment and how their daily experience as an artist or a mother who has their child in the after school program they feel that they can get behind the longer term idea of what a plan can do but I think it's part of the challenge of seeing okay so we have this plan for what it's going to be the more immediate impact knowing that a greater impact over time is possible as well and just becoming more clear and better with how that's communicated or how DCA plans to communicate that and then it's ongoing for one to three months but then it will be ongoing we will all be watching if it's okay with you we also have a little research that we have outside so we can continue the conversation maybe follow up with it thank you by the way for our translation we have a separate recording and for that thank you all for coming for coming here but I think it's a symbol in theatre why we like theatre also it's a model for something it happens on a stage well it might happen in life that's why we like to look at stories this now happens here well something might happen and I think there is something to be in mind I think something is happening with this and I think this is a big contribution you all made with your mighty pastos and being here and you might be proven also right but thank you for coming thank you