By : Alula Hussen
9 min read
Sites for creation, our intimations at communication and imagination, have faced challenges in the metro Boston area for decades. Grassroots efforts to support the arts remain encumbered by red tape and rising rents, making it feel nearly impossible to ‘make it’ as an artist, a designer, a writer, an advocate, or any of the ways of being and earning that fulfill us and uplift communities. Children’s programming suffers too, as do all of us who count creatives among our friends and family; the hustle is killing us softly with his word, as it were. There’s a tepid light at the end of the tunnel, one that bears much promise but also carries many questions: the Creative Space Preservation Act (coded as H.3241/S.530)--a bill put forth to Massachusetts’ State Senate and House of Representatives by Senator Liz Miranda and Representative Dan Cahill--aims to hem the hemorrhaging. We should offer critical support for this vital piece of legislation; but we can also push it to work for us, on our terms.
The basics of the forthcoming legislation are as follows: the Creative Space Preservation Act will introduce new codes to Massachusetts state zoning laws, allowing for buildings and parcels of land to be designated specifically and solely for creative activity, production, performance, and exhibition (as well as for live/work studio arrangements). In addition, the Act will create a structure for cities and towns to establish trust funds dedicated to supporting arts and arts spaces (called a “Municipal Creative Space Trust Fund”). The fund will be governed by a board of trustees, including city/town chief executive officers (e.g. a mayor, as in Boston, or a city manager, as in Cambridge) and a member of their local/regional Cultural Council (if one exists in the township or municipality); this board is responsible for managing and apportioning the fund’s moneys towards creating new arts spaces, as well as towards funding and maintaining existing spaces. Much of the bill’s text describes these specific powers and abilities, outlining how this trust, which would also be considered a municipal agency, is able to function. Such a trust fund has immense power to support cultural workers, fund public art, and hold/develop property; a similar concept, percent-for-art (which allocates a percentage of city capital projects funding toward public arts) exists in Boston and is partially responsible for the boom in murals we see across the city. Philadelphia was the first city to pass percent-for-the-arts, and is now known as the Mural Capital of the World. These new tools give cities new opportunities to step up and provide for their cultural backbones--if used correctly.
At a press conference held on September 19th to present the new legislation, hope and healing held the air; The Muse at 336 Blue Hill Avenue, an arts and performance space founded by Travis Brooks, hosted a policy discussion about the arts, their role in this state, and how this new bill will help artists hold their ground. Speakers and attendees ranged widely, from Miranda and Cahill themselves alongside their staffers; to folks like Eddosa, a member of the Diaspora Mass team who welcomed me in and directed me to the plethora of cookies and coffee available for consumption; and Andrew Kucenski, accomplished horn player and program manager at the Boston Music Project, who shared his excitement at the possibility of stability that the new bill offers.
Leaders at MASSCreative, a nonprofit arts and culture advocacy organization, and the executive director of the Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC), Marc Draisen, mingled amongst the crowd and spoke at the conference--both groups had a hand in drafting the Creative Space Preservation Act. According to Kelsey Rode, Director of External Relations at MASSCreative, the bill came out of “regional listening sessions to hear from artists and creatives, in their respective communities, about issues that are important to them. A recurring concern across the state is the need to preserve creative maker spaces.”
Draisen presented a compelling case for the Creative Space Preservation Act, explaining that the MAPC views arts and culture as integral to city stories and economies. Artists bring vitality, bring jobs, and bring opportunities to cities, just to get priced out once their economies develop; Draisen sees the Act as offering a leg up for artists and cultural workers. Ami Bennett, representing the ARTSTAYSHERE Coalition (which recently helped artists at Humphreys Street Studios gain majority ownership of their facilities), highlighted the pressing need for legislation that enshrines an approach towards saving the arts; in her assessment, “supporting artists is not sustainable doing it piecemeal as we do”.
I’m curious here, though. I’m not sure what the right avenue is to mobilize critiques of a bill that’s already been introduced to legislature, but I’d love to see this trust take direct input from constituents à la the participatory budgeting initiatives that have passed in Cambridge and Boston--we should get to directly decide which arts organizations and spaces receive funding! As it the bill currently stands, these boards are the sole determiners of our cultural futures, and there is no method described in the bill for us as city residents to even elect a board member, let alone to decide on our own how to allocate moneys. The problem here is compounded by the informality of many upstart organizations: before they receive non-profit status or incorporate, many arts spaces and groups operate as pop-ups and loose associations, keeping costs low and allowing them mobility and flexibility. Ideally, the state would equitably support these orgs, which are often Black and brown-led. However, it’s equally (if not more) possible that this bill will funnel money into formally established, whiter institutions, leaving many in the lurch.
I register all of these questions and suppositions not to over-problematize a bill that hasn’t even been passed; to the contrary, the Creative Space Preservation Act is potentially part of an answer to many of the problems we are mired in as a statewide arts community. But it must be accompanied by other developments. Rode herself explained that MASSCreative “recognize(s) that the Commonwealth needs to put forward additional policies and frameworks to address the larger question of affordability, but this bill would help curb artist displacement.” Setting aside property to be used for creative endeavors is an amazing feat; this bill will also allow cities to create “provisions to restrict the resale price of all or part of the property in order to assure its affordability” (quote pulled from the bill itself). One fruitful way to keep property affordable, and to keep it community-owned and community-controlled, is via a land trust, and I’d love to see arts land trusts sprout up alongside this legislation. We’ve already seen impressive results from such arrangements nationwide, from Dudley Neighbors, Inc using eminent domain to acquire land for affordable housing, to the Kensington Corridor Trust in Philadelphia that has combined a nonprofit and a perpetual purpose trust into one entity that is community-owned and holds space for local commercial entities and housing. This is a potential path forward that is ripe for the implementing. Imagine affordable rents for studio spaces, cheaper hourly and monthly rates for artists, designated pop-up and residency-based locations that are publicly owned and operated; our Commonwealth has the opportunity to make strides towards a creative economy that serves us.
We can await coming developments with bated breath; or, maybe, we can move and call our representatives, stepping alongside MASSCreative, the Massachusetts Cultural Council, and the 45 organizations and 104 individuals endorsings this bill, pushing them to ensure that this bill is what we want it to be, and to ensure that it gets passed. We need to take action! I don’t want NOSA Gallery to have to move from its prime location in Nubian Square; I need EXIT Galleries to stay right where it’s at, just a fifteen-minute-walk away from my room in Allston. I want Thrill to have a permanent performance and community space for the many musicians who rely on their support and managment, and I’m excited for what’s next at Dorchester Art Project as it moves towards cooperative organization, ownership, and decision-making--let this all be in support of a new economy that fosters and facilitates worlds only we can imagine, once given the sustained opportunity.
Originally published in-print in Boston Compass Newspaper #163 November 2023
Check out all the art and columns of November's Boston Compass at www.issuu.com/bostoncccompass
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