FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Wielding his veto pen nine months ago, Gov. Ron DeSantis wiped out state arts and culture grants, sparking a bipartisan outcry — and forcing hundreds of Florida theater, visual art, dance, music and other cultural organizations to scramble to close unexpected budget shortfalls and salvage their programs.

Arts and culture grants may soon have a revival.

If the governor and Florida Legislature come to terms, the funding could make a comeback in the state budget for the fiscal year that starts July 1 — possibly with significant changes that leave out organizations that were funded in the past, reduce the influence of experts in different arts genres, and place more power over which organizations get grants in the hands of a DeSantis political appointee.

The DeSantis administration also wants the Florida House and Senate to attach more strings by changing state law to require that programming is “appropriate for all age groups.”

That phrase or one similar appears five times in relation to arts and culture funding and oversight in proposed legislation (House Bill 1011 and Senate Bill 1524) that contains major changes to the current system. The “appropriate for all age groups” provision has sparked concerns among arts organizations, and a sponsor of the legislation, state Rep. Chip LaMarca, a Broward Republican, said it’s too broad. He said he and others are working on changes.

Meanwhile, the overall uncertainty about funding — the amounts, the timing and the rules — is taking a toll, said Marjorie Waldo, president and CEO of Arts Garage, the Delray Beach venue that offers live music, theater, comedy, visual arts and more.

“It’s shortsighted,” Waldo said. “The impact of arts and culture on people and communities is easily apparent. People move to vibrant communities that are filled with arts and culture.”

Clare Vickery, founder of the Grace Arts Center in Fort Lauderdale, which produces a range of cultural exhibits and performances throughout the state, said that the arts enhance quality of life and the economy benefits when people attend a show, concert or exhibition, and go to dinner.

Mounting a program, even when it’s free to the public, involves paying artists and contractors, Vickery said.

Who’s in, who’s out?

After the veto late last spring, there are promising signs, Vickery said.

Earlier this year, the proposed budget the governor recommended to the Legislature for the next fiscal year recommended $26 million for arts and culture funding and $6 million in facilities grants for the coming fiscal year. Those are the same amounts DeSantis vetoed from the current year’s budget.

The proposal also recommends another $1 million in arts and culture grant money to pay for programs related to the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 2026.

The list of grants recommended by the Secretary of State’s Office include many familiar, big name Broward and Palm Beach County organizations.

Many are in line for the maximum of $150,000 each. Among them: Kravis Center for Performing Arts, the Lighthouse Art Center, Palm Beach Opera, Lynn Conservatory of Music, the Morikami, the Cox Science Center and Aquarium in Palm Beach County and Flamingo Gardens and the Bonnet House in Broward.

The Broward Center for Performing Arts got a positive recommendation for two $150,000 grants, one listing the center and the other to its foundation.

Smaller organizations, like Vickery’s Grace Arts Center ($75,000) are in line for smaller grants.

Also on the list are the Master Chorale of South Florida, the Fort Lauderdale Children’s Theater, Brazilian Voices, the Stranahan House Museum: and Girl Choir of South Florida, all in Broward, and the Boca Raton Philharmonic Symphonia in Palm Beach County.

This year’s recommended list brought a departure from past practice — that has excluded many well-known and not as prominent groups in South Florida and around the state. Many that received funding in the past didn’t get included.

The lists of recommended organizations, along with those that received passing scores but weren’t recommended, were obtained and widely distributed by the Florida Cultural Alliance, which includes many state arts and culture organizations.

Applicants that scored well but weren’t on list recommended for funding include The Boca Raton Historical Society, the Spady Cultural Heritage Museum, the Zoological Society of the Palm Beaches (the formal name for the Palm Beach Zoo located in Dreher Park in West Palm Beach), the Lake Worth Playhouse, the Boca Ballet Theatre Company, the Fort Lauderdale Historical Society, the Holocaust Documentation and Education Center in Dania Beach, ArtServe in Fort Lauderdale, the South Florida Symphony Orchestra, and the Broward County Film Society (for the annual Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival).

Also not on the list for funding: The organization Waldo heads, Creative City Collaborative of Delray Beach, better known as Arts Garage.

Scoring change

Leaders of many arts organizations are concerned and perplexed by the list of recommended grants prepared by the Secretary of State’s Office, which is run by a DeSantis appointee.

Arts and culture grant recipients go through an extensive vetting process. It was altered this year.

Panels of reviewers examine and score the proposals. In past years, said Waldo — who has been a reviewer — several reviewers on a panel would contribute scores and they would be averaged.

Multiple panels were used to divide the work. “What one person sees might be abated by what another person might see. It felt like a pretty fair system,” she said.

Last year, Arts Garage’s application was reviewed by a panel of five volunteers who read 44 applications. This year, the state used fewer reviewers and each had to do much more work. Waldo said this year’s Arts Garage application was examined by two reviewers who were responsible for 65 applications.

In the past, reviewers left comments, allowing recipients who didn’t make the cut to try to figure out how they could do better the next year. This year, Waldo said, there were no comments.

All that was the backdrop to a significant change, said Jennifer Jones, president and CEO of the Florida Cultural Alliance.

In the past, organizations that scored 80 or higher were forwarded to the Legislature for it to consider how much money it would award for grants in the state budget.

This year, only organizations that scored 95 or better were included. “They’ve whacked out everybody except those who scored 95 or higher,” said Mark B. Kent, executive director of the Gay Men’s Chorus of South Florida.

The chorus scored 94.5. Arts Garage scored 91.

In previous years, if the total amount for the groups that scored 80 or above was greater than what the Legislature appropriated, all received the same reduced percentage. If the Legislature appropriated $25 million for $50 million of projects, each would get 50%, Jones said.

“I don’t begrudge anyone receiving funding. I really don’t. There are some magnificent organizations. What they’re doing is they’re funding at 100% all these high-scoring organizations,” Kent said. “They’re leaving a lot of growing and emerging arts organizations out. And I don’t know that you can fuel a healthy arts community in the state if you only fund the people who are only at that top tier and don’t fuel growth in that more grassroots manner.”

Kent said a score of 80 was the “rulebook that we’ve all been playing by” for years. “All of a sudden someone made the decision this year — I don’t know who, I don’t know what reason — someone decided they would make that list 95 and above. I don’t know where that happened in the process,” he said.

The Florida Division of Arts and Culture is a unit of the Florida Secretary of State’s Office. And the Florida Council on Arts and Culture, appointees who compile the grant recommendations, is housed there as well. The Secretary of State’s Office didn’t respond to questions about the scoring changes.

LaMarca said the Legislature is unlikely to cede additional authority over what’s funded to the executive branch of government. “From the standpoint of the scoring, I think we’re going to push back a little bit,” he said. “I think the scoring issue will have some additional changes.”

The Gay Men’s Chorus of South Florida performs the National Anthem during the city of Fort Lauderdale’s State of the City Address on Feb. 28, 2019, at NSU Art Museum. (South Florida Sun Sentinel file photo)

Age appropriate

Proposed changes in state law sought by the Secretary of State’s Office would make a significant change: requiring recipients of state money to be appropriate for all ages.

Grant recommendations would have to be for “activities and programs that are appropriate for all age groups,” recipients would be required to “conduct activities and programs that are appropriate for all age groups,” and reviewers would have to ensure “appropriateness of content for all age groups.”

Arts advocates said the language is broad and so vague that they can’t tell if the “all ages” requirement would prohibit them from applying for state funding if they put on programming limited to adults even if that show or performance doesn’t receive any state money.

The concept of appropriation for all age groups is “pretty broad. There’s a lot in the spectrum,” Jones said, terming it “really subjective” and “not really clear.”

Unclear in the bill as originally drafted is whether an organization seeking state funding can put on any programming that isn’t suitable for all ages, even if it’s not using state money for that purpose. “Am I even eligible to apply?” Jones said.

Kent also said the proposed appropriate for all ages requirement “is a very subjective criteria.”

He said the Gay Men’s Chorus shows are all appropriate for all ages. “There is nothing sexual. There is no nudity,” he said, citing a night of Broadway music the chorus performed on March 21. “I don’t know of a child yet who has been harmed by show tunes.”

Waldo said Arts Garage is careful with its programming and hasn’t used state money for anything some could see as problematic. “We had planned to be very cautious and respectful of the current sentiment at the government level.”

But she said the lack of clarity in the proposed legal change is an issue. She is concerned it could prohibit an exhibition that includes “tasteful nudity … not pornography” of the kind that might be seen in any museum in the world, if that provision became law.

The state began investigating restaurants with liquor licenses in 2022 for holding drag shows, and did the same with some major entertainment venues that held performances of “A Drag Queen Christmas” at which some people brought children.

Arts Garage wasn’t investigated, but Waldo said it stopped hosting drag shows at the venue. “We have windows. And I can’t control whether you bring your 5-year-old or 10-year-old downtown when we have a drag show,” she said. “I chose to be conservative.”

Vickery said she, too, has long been careful. But if she were to have put on any “over 18-only material, and I was getting state funding, obviously I’d be concerned.”

Content that may not be appropriate for young children still deserves state funding, Jones said, citing exhibits on the Holocaust or works about slavery. “We need to see challenging subjects and sometimes art and culture is the way to handle it. The arts help us (understand) things that are challenging, at times disturbing,” she said.

The original version of the legislation from the Secretary of State’s Office would also apply the age appropriate change to other areas the agency oversees: libraries, historic preservation and maintenance of abandoned African American cemeteries.

LaMarca said the appropriate-for-all-ages language has been the subject of negotiations and would almost certainly change before the bill moves forward.

Like the arts advocates, he said there are many programs that aren’t appropriate for everyone but deserve state funding. “Photos at The Holocaust Documentation & Education Center in Dania Beach would not be appropriate for a 3- or 4-year old,” he said. “Shows that might be more mature in nature might not also be.”

He said better legislative language might be “age appropriate” that “clarifies that we’re not funding with public dollars anything that could be harmful to or inappropriate for minors.”

Other changes

The DeSantis administration wants to attach more strings to the state money, and has asked the Legislature to give more discretion to his hand-picked secretary of state over arts and culture decisions.

— The makeup of the Florida Council on Arts and Culture would be changed. Of its 15 members, nine would be appointed by the governor and three by the Senate president and three by the speaker of the House. Under current law, the governor picks seven members and the legislative leaders have a majority, with four each appointed by the Senate president and House speaker.

— Criteria for arts council membership would be tweaked. A requirement for members to have “traditional” experience be added.

— One of the council’s duties would be eliminated from state law. Stricken would be the requirement that it “assist freedom of artistic expression that is essential for the well being of the arts.

— Grant review panels would change. The Secretary of state would be empowered to appoint “reviewers.” Gone would be the requirement for “review panels consisting of members from various art and cultural disciplines and programs” and a requirement that those reviewing a subject area “consist of practicing artists or other professionals actively involved in the specific discipline or program for which the panel has been appointed.”

— Panels would no longer submit lists of eligible applicants by score. Reviewers’ recommendations would no longer be which grants “should” be awarded, and instead list those that “may” be awarded.

— Reviewers’ recommendations would go to the Arts Council, which would develop a list of grant recipients. The secretary of state could “review and edit the list.”

LGBTQ groups omitted

LGBTQ-related arts groups, many of which have received funding before, have questions.

“None of our LGBTQ-plus arts organizations are on this list” for the coming fiscal year, Kent said. Until all were eliminated last spring by DeSantis, the Gay Men’s Chorus has received funding for the 10 years he’s been with the organization, Kent said.

Others not recommended for funding are the Stonewall Library & Archives in Fort Lauderdale, the World AIDS Museum in Fort Lauderdale, and the Orlando Gay Chorus. (Another, much smaller category of grants Culture Builds Florida had $432,000 of recommended projects with scores of 95 and above. Among those that didn’t receive funding because they were below that level was the South Florida Pride Bands, based in Broward.)

Kent said he doesn’t know if the system was changed to eliminate funding LGBTQ-related groups or that was a byproduct of the changes.

“I couldn’t help but wonder that. I do see there are some programs and funds being made that serve diverse communities. A few here and there,” he said. “I can’t help but notice there is not a single LGBTQ arts organization on there. Whether that was in someone’s mind, whether (the same person) decided it would be 95% or 90% or not, I would have no way of knowing that.”

No response

The secretary of state, Cord Byrd, was one of the more conservative members of the Florida House of Representatives, when DeSantis appointed him in 2022. His wife, Esther Byrd, is a DeSantis appointee to the state Board of Education.

The Secretary of State’s Office didn’t respond to a series of questions: why money was recommended for arts and culture grants a year after DeSantis vetoed all funding, why the score for inclusion on the lists of recommended grants was raised to 95 from the previous 80, who decided to make the change, why the secretary feels it’s necessary to have more authority over grants, and why the agency wanted the “appropriate for all ages” provision in state law.

The only listed member of the Florida Council on Arts and Culture from Broward or Palm Beach counties is Lisa Burgess, the owner of New River Fine Art, a gallery on Las Olas Boulevard. DeSantis appointed her in 2020 and reappointed her last year.

The council website still listed her as a member on Thursday. In a March 20 email, Burgess said she had resigned from the council “due to constraints in my time caused by a new business start-up,” and said she didn’t feel it was appropriate to comment on the activities of the council, the secretary of state or the governor.

After last year’s veto, Burgess told WPLG-Ch. 10 that she was “a supporter of Governor DeSantis and I voted for him, and I do think he’s doing a great job with the state, nobody gets it right 100% of the time, and I do think he got this decision wrong.”

When Kent heard from another applicant that there was “something amiss there” he reached out to the Division of Arts and Culture, a unit of the Secretary of State’s Office. “I received a very concise statement back that grants were sent forward.”

The agency’s response said in part that, “The Council voted unanimously that the Secretary of State could add or delete recommendations prior to submission to the Legislature for funding consideration.”

Other grants

Another category of grants vetoed last year, and recommended for the new fiscal year is $6 million for facilities.

If the recommendations hold and money is approved, South Florida recipients would include:

— The Museum of Discovery and Science in Fort Lauderdale, $500,000.

— The Adolph & Rose Levis Jewish Community Center, west of Boca Raton, $500,000.

— The Lauderdale Lakes Community Center, $200,000.

— The Maltz Jupiter Theatre for a conservatory expansion, $500,000.

— The Cox Science Center and Aquarium for a learning center, $500,000.

— The city of West Park for construction of a cultural center, $500,000.

Legislature’s hands

The Legislature is nearing the midway point of the annual session, scheduled to adjourn on May 2.

Jones said “we’ve had constructive conversations” with legislators.

Vickery said she traveled to Tallahassee for Arts and Cultural Advocacy Day on March 12, and reactions from Republican and Democratic senators and representatives were positive.

“I heard really great things from them about what they wanted to see, what would happen with the arts,” she said. “The legislators all said they believe the arts should be funded. I don’t think they just said that. I think they believe that.”

LaMarca said his aim is to resurrect and preserve the funding. He’s navigating a range of political and budgetary considerations. “I want to make sure that what happened last year never happens again.”

Arts advocates said they believe him. “He’s a good-faith guy. And he has been very, very supportive of the arts,” Jones said.

The night before the arts lobbying day, arts organizations held a social event at the Challenger Learning Center, near the state Capitol. Music came from House of Rock, playing ‘80s rock. LaMarca is a founding member of the band and its drummer.

“Chip is a huge supporter of the arts. He’s definitely shown that,” Vickery said. “He’s very clear: The arts must be funded.”

Jones said her members have always known nothing is guaranteed. This year, she said, “There is great concern. We’re still trying to be optimistic.”

Waldo, whose organization scored 91, just below the new cutoff of 95, is less sanguine. “I guess my bubble was burst last year.”

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