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SAVE THE ARTS!
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Here are some ways you can have your voice heard re the
funding cuts to the arts, literacy and social organizations.
Write, email or phone today!
Hon. Gordon Campbell
Ph: 250-387-1715
F: 250-387-0087
PO Box 9041
STN PROV GOVT
Victoria, BC V8W 9E1
premier@gov.bc.ca
Hon. Colin Hansen
Minister of Finance and Deputy Premier
Ph: 250-387-3751
F: 250-387-5594
PO Box 9048
STN PROV GOVT
Victoria, BC V8W 9E2
Fin.Minister@gov.bc.ca
Hon. Rich Coleman
Minister of Housing and Social Development (includes Gaming)
Ph: 250-356-7750
F: 250-356-7292
PO Box 9058
STN PROV GOVT
Victoria, BC V8W 9E1
EIA.Minister@gov.bc.ca
Hon. Kevin Krueger
Minister of Tourism, Culture and the Arts
Ph: 250-356-5255
F: 250-953-4250
PO Box 9071
STN PROV GOVT
Victoria, BC V8W 9E9
TSA.Minister@gov.bc.ca
Carole James
Leader of the Opposition (NDP), MLA for Victoria/Beacon Hill
Ph: 250-952-4211
1084 Fort St
Victoria, BC V8W 3K4
carole.james.mla@leg.bc.ca
Maurine Karagianis
MLA Esquimalt/Metchosin
Ph: 250-479-8326
100 Aldersmith Place
Victoria, BC, V9A 7M8
maurine.karagianis.mla@leg.bc.ca
Rob Fleming
MLA Victoria/Swan Lake
Ph: 250-360-2023
1020 Hillside Ave
Victoria, BC V8T 2A2
Rob.fleming.mla@leg.bc.ca
Spencer Herbert
MLA Vancouver/West End
Ph: 604-660-7307
923 Denman St
Vancouver, BC, V6G 2L9
Spencer.herbert.mla@leg.bc.ca
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| Protesting Cuts to the Arts: If you are interested to participate in the campaign against cuts to the arts, an excellent website has been developed that features prominent BC (and other Canadian) artists speaking out against the cuts including William Gibson, Brian Jungen, Sarah McLachlan, Margaret Atwood, our friend Veda Hille and many others. It also included a concise summary of the facts, addresses for MLAs, and current updates. This excellent information resource can be accessed by going to http://www.stopbcartscuts.ca/ |
November 3rd 2009: from MLA Herbert Spencer Spencer.Herbert.MLA@leg.bc.ca
Dear Friends of the Arts,
I thought you would be interested to see the work that I have been doing most recently on behalf of the arts and culture community as the Official Opposition Critic for Tourism, Culture, and the Arts. During the recent estimates process where the Opposition has the ability to ask questions of government Ministers about the budgets their Ministries have put forward, I questioned Minister Krueger regarding his decision to slash core funding to arts and
culture down to $3.6 million in 2010.
The Minister however refused to answer any questions about the budget years for 2010-2011, or 2011, 2012 for the Ministry. I made the argument that people need to plan for the future, and I was hoping as the Minister who had preceded him had done he could give some indication of his government’s priorities.
I was happy that Minister Krueger acknowledged the economic and societal benefits that flow from arts and culture in our province but disappointed that he then continued to use the false dichotomy that the BC government has had to cut funding for the arts in order to pay for health care and education.
This despite the fact that funding for the arts actually results in a substantial return in investment to BC and therefore could increase our ability to fund health care and education.
This is a very important issue and I will continue to fight to support our arts and culture industry here in BC. Below, I have attached the transcript from the debate for your information.
Please be in touch if you have any comments, suggestions or questions for me.
Spencer.Herbert.MLA@leg.bc.ca |
From Christopher Butterfield:
Stop The Cuts- if you are interested in a more detailed breakdown of how we are getting beat up.
The actual percentages/ figures are extremely byzantine because Hansen/Coleman/Krueger have engineered them to be byzantine. It took us weeks to figure it out, and that's why everyone's referring to it as a shell game.
There are 3 sources of arts funding:
1. Direct tax revenue money, either awarded to the BCAC ( to fund organizations as it sees fit) or to directly funded projects;
2. The "150" initiative (it was a $150 million endowment to the BCAC (BC Arts Council) meant to generate enough interest to support the BCAC, in place of direct tax revenue;
3. Gaming money, given directly to arts organizations (not through the BC Arts Council).
What has happened to these 3 sources of funding?
1. The direct tax revenue money has mostly been entirely eliminated.
2. A $150 million endowment was founded to help support the arts by generating revenue to be put into the BC Arts Council. This was never originally meant to fully cover arts funding. It would never have generated the amount of regular tax revenue that used to go into arts funding, and in this economy "the 150" endowment has performed extremely poorly, generating only 7 milllion this year (2%). Yet they can say they put in "150 million," not that the arts are seeing any more of that money than the 7 million. That's what Alma Lee is talking about on www.stopbcartscuts.ca/speakout.html<http://www.stopbcartscuts.ca/speakout.html>. It's not 150 million in any practical sense. It would take decades to grow.
3. As for gaming funds, they've been sneakily moved around. By retracting direct gaming money that used to be given directly to arts organizations and then putting some of that back into the BCAC instead, even while they have also cut tax revenue money from the BCAC, and also by counting "the 150"'s contribution to the BCAC, they have been able to say that the BCAC has "had no cuts this year." That's the substance of the lie-of-omission - the total arts cuts are 50% this year, but if they say "the BCAC hasn't been cut" then they can pretend there haven't been net arts funding cuts.
In short, what are the real numbers?
All you really need to know is that no matter what Krueger says, the cuts this year are 50% and by next year they absolutely do amount to approx. 90% in 2011. Period. And the following year will be between 91% and 94% of the original $47 million (already a Canadian low). The govt wants to offload arts funding onto private funding entirely, with all the artistic problems that kind of funding brings with it.
Coleman, head of Gaming, is now being considered the de facto arts minister only because the Libs are trying to switch to the Alberta model of funding arts only through Gaming. Even so, they want to drop even that level of arts funding down, even within Gaming. Coleman's personal priorities include things like cadets, and I can provide a copy of Coleman's letter to me which outlines these new priorities. The lotteries made well over a billion last year but only a tiny portion of that, less than 200 million, is going to charity, a fact which has been hidden from gamblers who think their money's all going to charity. It's not. It's mostly flowing back into tax revenue, something that's normally considered a bit tin-pot for obvious reasons. Selling CN Rail for what it was worth would have funded all this stuff easily. Etc. etc.
Christopher Butterfield
Associate professor of composition
School of Music, University of Victoria
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Coalition for the Defence of Writing & Publishing in B.C.
Margaret Reynolds 604-684-0228 / margaret@books.bc.ca
In Shadow of Cuts, BC Books Dominate Governor General’s Literary Awards Shortlist
Of thirty-five books nominated for the 2009 Governor-General’s Literary Awards, English-language, ten are written by BC authors and eight are published by BC publishers.
This high BC proportion of shortlisted titles is a testament to the quality of writing and publishing taking place in the province.
“This province boasts some of the most talented writers in the country,” says Andrew Wooldridge, Publisher of Orca Book Publishers and President of the Association of Book Publishers of BC. “This news should give the provincial government pause as they contemplate even greater cuts to the BC arts community”.
The news that so many authors from BC are to be honoured comes just one week after the provincial government announced that it was eliminating the funding for three key literary organizations in the province, BC BookWorld, the Association of Book Publishers of BC and the BC Association of Magazine Publishers. In two weeks government will debate the budget estimates for 2010/11 in which support for the BC Arts Council has been reduced by 90%, putting in jeopardy grants for writers, the publishing of cultural titles and support for literary periodicals.
Rhona MacInnes, BCAMP Executive Director, is concerned that the cuts to the BCAC will erode BC’s ability to produce excellence on a national and international level. “Literary and cultural magazines are where writers cut their literary teeth, they are incubators for great writing,” she says. The Western Magazine Awards, where this excellence is also recognized, have just been notified that their funding has been eliminated.
Governor General’s Literary Award finalist, Robin Stevenson, is concerned that the modest support for writers currently available will disappear in next year’s budget. “It is such a huge honour to be nominated for this award,” said Stevenson, who is a BC Arts Council grant recipient and member of the Federation of BC Writers, “but I’m worried that BCAC funding that is so crucial to the support of BC’s writing talent will be lost”.
Margaret Reynolds, ABPBC Executive Director, agrees, “BC’s strong showing at the GGs shows the effectiveness of the system that the BC government is dismantling,” she says. “Our province will be the sorrier for it.”
Congratulations to all the BC publishers and writers nominated this year. A complete list is attached.
Media Contact Information:
Margaret Reynolds 604-684-0228/Margaret@books.bc.ca |
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