Open Letter to the City of Ventura

Respected members of the council,

In regards to city planning, funding, and recent developments in the arts funding of the city of Ventura:

The city of Ventura currently faces a major economic and fiscal crisis of unprecedented proportions- in large part brought on by a declining tax base as real estate values and retail sales nose dive, not to mention the $10 million in bad investments and bungling on the part of the city. So what is it proposing to do? Cut back on the one engine capable of accelerating the recovery of the city- that is, her arts.

A lot has been invested in creating a "New Art City" in Ventura. New blood and talent has moved into Ventura in the past year or two. Cutting this growth toward a critical mass at this vulnerable time may be a long-term mistake difficult to correct later. Once it gets out that you've cut off the New Arts City track, it will be very difficult to resurrect. Short-changing the arts now could do permanent and long-term damage.

But have the arts in Ventura been that well-supported even up to now? As the North Avenue Developmet project, a project for a part of the city central to a lot of its current and future arts growth and rejunenation, several years after its inception languishes without a designer or serious support within the city machinery, having missed many of its intermediary goals, is now still number four on the priority list, the Auto Center development project sits as the number one priority.

The Auto center - wouldn't that have saved us in this economy!!

The Mid-town corridor, another critical area, isn't even on the planning list. Concurrently, the city sits poised to throw its cultural plan out the window. We see a pattern here- of short-sighted misjudgement compromising solid long-term thinking.

We probably should be asking why the arts are and have not been receiving MORE support. Instead we are debating whether the arts will continue at the level of their past, inadequate priority and support. And it is just not arts issues that are ill-thought-out. Raising sales taxes in down times, when there is a shortage of buyers, only drives sales elsewhere.

Then there's the kids. If you've ever seen the excited, joyous faces of the kids that rush into the Bell Arts kids art classes- the younger sisters and brothers of the teenagers selling drugs on the street only blocks away, you'll realize how much the arts mean for our future and these kid's future.

Remember, any vote by the council or move against the arts today is a vote against the future: it is a vote against the economic future of Ventura, it is a vote against our kids, and their future. Strangely, there are those who believe that cutting a buck from the arts today actually saves them a buck tomorrow. In reality, every buck cut from the arts today costs us many times that tomorrow.