Public Agency

Landscape dominates Oregon. Its beaches, mountains, and rivers beckon Oregonians to spend their leisure time hiking, skiing, and fishing. Many Portland residents routinely exit the city on weekends, choosing outdoors over urban culture. It is within this enticing natural environment that Portland's arts and cultural institutions must engage their audiences and make their way as financially viable institutions.

Foundation grantmakers are investors. The endowment that sustains a grantmaking program demands the same concentrated, strategic thinking that developing a focus for a giving program entails. The challenge addressed in this essay is to bring together these two basic functions — investing and grantmaking. The context for doing so is socially responsible investing. My purpose is to take an expanded definition of socially responsible investing and see if it has a meaningful role to play in arts philanthropy.

1999, 10 pages, Institute of Museum and Library Services, 1100 Pennsylvania Avenue N.W., Washington, D.C. 20506.

The Institute of Museum and Library Services has issued a companion piece to its 1997 publication "True Needs, True Partners: Museums and Schools Transforming Education." The earlier publication profiled fifteen successful museum education projects and suggested factors that form the foundation for successful school-museum partnerships.

1997, 175 pages, Columbia College, 1001 Rogers Road, Columbia, Missouri 65216, Review by Gita Gulati, The Cleveland Foundation.

Rebuilding the Front Porch of America is a collection of previously presented essays by Patrick Overton, an arts administrator and community organizer in Missouri. In this short but substantive book, Overton defines community arts as “the new front porch of America,” a place where family, friends, and neighbors gather to share their stories.

To Protect the Powerless in the Digital Age
An Open Letter to Foundations: To Protect the Interests of the Powerless in the Digital Age, Communications Researchers Need Your Support

The "open letter" has a number of signers.
August 12, 1998. 33 pages. The Civil Rights Forum on Communications Policy, 818 18th Street, N.W. Suite 810, Washington, D.C. 20006, 202-887-0301, forum[at]civilrightsforum.org.

Typically when businesses decide to support the arts they do so through a grant-giving mechanism or through a program that places employees as volunteers and consultants in arts organizations. But, I've noticed a different kind of interaction between the profit-making and not-for-profit art worlds in recent years. Some business people have set up foundations dedicated to improving the ethical and cultural context in which their own professions practice.

1997, 107 pages, Dance/USA, 1156 Fifteenth Street N.W., Suite 820, Washington D.C. 20005-1704, 202-833-1717, fax 212-833-2686, danceusa[at]artswire.org

The Arts and the Public Purpose 92nd American Assembly

From May 29 through June 1 of this year, seventy-eight individuals interested in the arts in the United States came together for the 92nd American Assembly at Arden House in Harriman, New York to debate "The Arts and the Public Purpose." The American Assembly was established by Dwight D. Eisenhower at Columbia University in 1950. Each year it holds at least two nonpartisan meetings on topics related to United States policy, each of which gives rise to a book on the subject discussed.

Here in Los Angeles, the thought of an "arts funding community" had been something of an oxymoron. Because of corporate policy, political agendas, and familial preferences, arts grantmakers have long worked in isolation from one another. Sure, we like one another, go to the same shows, eat the same special-event salmon, but collaborate and communicate on a regular basis? Well, if only...

Lance T. Izumi is a senior fellow in California studies at the Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy. The following text is based on a transcript of Izumi's remarks at a symposium sponsored by the Western States Arts Federation (WESTAF). The topic of the two-day symposium was the support of visual artists. It was held in Seattle on December 4 and 5, 1997. The remarks are published here with permission of Izumi and WESTAF.