Interview & photos by Thomas Mulready

No political issue of recent months has fired the imaginations and energies of Cleveland's cultural class like Cuyahoga County's Issue 31, which was defeated on March 2 by a vote of 47% to 53%. It would have raised $20.5 million a year for five years, of which half the funds, or $10 million, would have been devoted to the arts and culture of Cleveland and Cuyahoga County, the only region of its size that still doesn't have public funding for the arts. The other half would have gone for economic development issues such as brownfield abatement and small business loans. Since the election, various parties have used the results to justify a variety of interpretations. In order to get at the facts behind the campaign, the election results and the next steps for pursuing public funding for the arts, Cool Cleveland spoke directly with the three key campaign leaders. Chris Carmody, Issue 31 campaign manager, took a leave from his position as President of the Greater Cleveland Film Commission in order to direct the day-to-day details of the campaign. Tom Shorgl (pictured here), President of CPAC, the Community Partnership for Arts and Culture, that's worked for five years doing research and hosting over 50 public sessions exploring options for arts funding in our region. Jeff Rusnak, Senior Vice President of Burges and Burges, political consultants who were hired to manage the research, message, strategies, direct mail, TV ads, and electronic media for the Issue 31 campaign.

Cool Cleveland: In general, why do you think the issue didn’t pass?
Tom Shorgl: One of the things we ran into was a lack of time, we created a dedicated revenue stream for the arts, but didn’t have time to get through to the community...
Jeff Rusnak: Also confusion on the issue and the complexity...
Chris Carmody: I think it might have passed if it had been a pure arts issue…even arts patrons asked how the distribution would work. There's an axiom in politics - just when you get sick of it, that’s when it starts to register with voters. Five weeks was just not enough time.

Was it doomed from the start?
JR: You don’t know until you get into the campaign, we grew the support from 28% [at the beginning of the campaign] to a 47% final vote in a two month period. The public campaign was about five weeks out.

How much money was raised, and from whom?
JR: We raised close to $800k. Of that, arts and culture was $680k, and we received $120k from corporate community. Our goal was $500k from the arts community and $250k from the corporate community.
CC: For future passing [of a similar levy], it will be important to have the involvement & engagement of the corporate community.

What were the actual results of the voting?
JR: The vote was 46.74 yes to 53.26 no. Geographically, we did better east than west. Only 3 cities on west side voted "yes": Lakewood, Bay Village and Rocky River. Clearly our base of support was in the Eastern ward of the city where 62% voted "yes." Cleveland Hts, Shaker Hts, Beachwood, Pepper, University Hts, Warrensville Hts, East Cleve, Solon, Bedford Hts, and South Euclid, they all voted "yes" on Issue 31.
CC: Also look the type of tax this was. CPAC [Community Partnership for Arts and Culture] didn’t want a property tax, but that was the hand we were dealt. If there was a different type of tax, such as tobacco or sin tax, it would not have received the same level of “against” vote.
JR: The tax structure in this state is screwed up, with the dependence on property tax for so many things. I think we ought to find alternative ways to fund these projects.
TS: I would say in the next biennium, county governments are going to be in unison to ask state legislature to revamp county taxing & revenue generating systems that currently rely on property taxes. Except for Summit, all counties have to abide by what the general assembly says.
CC: We need the corporate community's support in a future funding initiative. More broadly, we need this corporate community to weigh in with state government to make everyone less reliant on property tax.
JR: We recognize the problems with schools is that they are so property tax dependent. The state has to make serious cuts every few months. End result is the county suffers, local government suffers, then they have to raise property taxes to make up for it.

What about the white collar/ blue collar dichotomy? Is there a division between these two groups in Cleveland?
CC: Actually, arts & culture is a no-collar activity.
JR: We know that 3/4ths of the electorate participates in the arts several times a year.
TS: If we'd had enough time, we would have been able to determine where the students who benfit from the arts live, and get the message out to their parents to broaden our voter base.

Is there a racial issue, between black & white?
JR: No, you have African Americans in the Eastern part of the city, and whites in the inner ring.
CC: We came close to winning Euclid, which is very diverse.
TS: When you get the suburban Mayors & Managers Association, along with United Pastors In Mission to endorse...

Can you make any assumptions based on precinct analysis? How do you think the other issues on the ballot affected the 31 vote?
JR: The fact that we were last on the ballot had an effect. If we had been at the top of the ballot, it would have been more positive. There is a rotation that the Board of Elections does [to order the issues on the ballot]. State issues are always first [at the top], then it was county issues, then local issues. Recently they’ve changed it to be an alphabetical rotation, in terms of the name of the community.
CC: There’s no question, even though Issue 31 was a small request. But it was one of up to 4 tax issues in some communities.
JR: And it was the last one: School, Library, Health & Human Services, then Issue 31.

There didn’t seem to be any organized effort against 31, but what are the built-in factors against any levy effort?
JR: There's always an anti-tax sentiment. Roughly 33% will be against any tax is the base; that could be as high as 40%. Early polling showed the "anti" base was 35% in Dec, when we started the campaign. So you have to get 75% of the remaining 65%. To pass it.
TS: and we came withing 3.2% of the 50% overall needed to pass.

The campaign seemed to energize the arts community. Can you talk about that?
TS: I think when you look at the number of arts organizations throughout Cuyahoga County, at least 75 arts organizations participated--East side, West side, with suburbs contributing money, power, volunteering, the distribution of 300,000 pieces of literature, scores of curtain speeches, all the way down to the gallery guards, ushers and trustees, everyone was galvanized. These people got to know each other.
CC: It gave other communities a greater appreciation of arts among organized labor, small business, religious groups.

31 also gained support from other key constituent groups in the region, such as labor, clergy, small business, WIRE-NET, Cleveland Neighborhood Development Corp, the suburban Mayors & Managers Association. Why do you think they supported this, and how much help were they in getting the vote out?
CC: They were substantial help. In the initial poll in December, union households did not do well, and the AFL helped out in that way.
JR: We grew in all areas across the board.
TS: Once organizations that allied to us understood what "economic development" meant, and that grants were available to other groups [besides arts groups], that resonated with them.
CC: When people supported it, like Cleveland Neighborhood Development Corporation, it was a diversified, neighborhood-by-neighborhood approach, rather than a huge, central thing.
RJ: This was about the future, a new, different and citizen-based initiative. The citizens demanded that the commissioners put this on the ballot.
TS: We’re not going to get it from the state or the feds. Taft is going to cut the Ohio Arts Council’s budget by an additional 4% in the current biennium, and another potential 6% cut in the next biennium. That's an almost 35-40% reduction in the last 6 years, lots of those dollars were coming to Cuyahoga County. Atleast $3 million in operating support funds on an annual basis, just in Cuyahoga County from the Ohio Arts Council cuts.

The Mayor finally endorsed 31 in the final days before election day. Do you think her endorsement, late as it was, was effective?
CC: I think it helped. I think it reassured a number of taxpayers that had the same questions she had about accountability for these tax dollars. I think it helped cement support.
TS: We’ve got to cultivate more champions. If an individual was elected, a majority of people put them there, so the more elected officials who support, the better it is.

One segment that spoke out against 31 was the editorial page of Crain’s Cleveland Business. Why do you think that happened?

JR: How about they are nearsighted? I think that they were so hung up on Issue 31 being property tax dependent, that this is another property tax rather than the accomplishements of this issue, had it passed. It is a simplistic way to say our focus is property tax dependent.

CC: I think Jeff is right. They had a concern about any additional property tax, which is a debatable point. They had a real lack of trust in the three county commissioners, which a number of people had. I think, and this is where we differ, they seemed to have a different set of priorities for economic development dollars than we did, and they felt that the convention center was a higher priority than arts and culture. I think what this effort will bring about is a more active public debate about which economic development effort will bring out the best ROI [return on investment].

TS: It's going to be incumbent upon the arts and culture community to bring the message back to the business community and work with organizations like Crains to articulate that return. There is clearly more work to be done in communicating the facts to traditional business organizations.

CC: Within the greater Cleveland Partnership, there was Alex Machaskee, Malachi Mixon of Invacare, Jamie Irelend, Terry Hamilton Brown of University Circle Incorporated, Steve Minter, Anthony Rego with Giant Eagle - all these people made cash contributions to the campaign. I want to make one point rather than beat up on the Greater Cleveland Partnership staff, who made the point that they completely supported the arts and culture, but they didn’t like this mechanism, and a lot of voters agreed with them. We have to find an improved mechanism. We started with two strikes: the property tax and the short time frame. The reason that I got engaged in this, and a lot of other people got engaged, was that this might be the only window in the next year or two that would achieve results. Because there are many things crowding the civic agenda right now.

What is the strategy going forward to bring the business community in line with the goals of public funding for the arts?
TS: We continue what we’re doing: our relationship with COSE [Council of Smaller Enterprises], they've been supportive of individual artists not only as entrepreneurs, and attracting entrepreneurs, as well as creating an environement that attracts the knowledge-based economy. With the merging of growth and Cleveland Tomorrow and Greater Cleveland Roundtable into the Greater Cleveland Tomorrow, the composition of that board is changing with new appointments such as Chris Carmody and Terri Hamilton Brown; it's recognizing that this is a very diverse community.
JR: It goes beyond the business community, it goes to the key non-profits who play a major role in the economic future of this community, they all need to be engaged in this process. Our healthcare community, they have to be brought into this conversation. If you’re the Clinic or University Hospitals and you’re trying to recruit a top notch researcher or physician, what are the two biggest reasons they would come here? First, the quality of the Clinic or UH, next the quality or caliber of the arts institutions in Cleveland that make it a place they want to move to and live in. What is the city like, what is the street scene?
TS: The door for stronger collaboration is open, and we in the arts community need to go through that door. Certainly Ed Hundert’s colloquium in January of '03 included how they looked at the role of the university in the life of the city. One of the major panels was arts and culture with the Minister of Culture from Toronto, along with the economic development person talking about how they worked together to strengthen the economy.
CC: I think the business recognizes that if the core Downtown, city and interior suburbs aren’t strong, the whole region suffers. And the core will never have the market for an Eaton place or Legacy Village, so we have to focus on what's unique and outstanding in the core, because you won’t have a Legacy Villlage downtown, but you have anchors like Playhouse Square.
JR: What you have at University Circle, Tremont, Ohio City, Old Brooklyn and Detroit Shoreway has a much better impact on what it does for the image, quality of life, and the identity of the city than what is happening in these Disneyesque creations like a Legacy Village.
CC: To engage the business community on this, Cleveland has to focus on what is unique and what we can be #1 at. I think that is something that the arts community is for Cleveland.
TS: This is not contrived, this is a genuine asset, not only the University Circle institutions, abut also the smaller neightborhood based institutions. Any metro area is envious of us: Austin, Columbus, Portland, Indianapolis, Seattle, any of them would love to have the depth, the cultural complexity, the quality cultural assets [that Cleveland has]. How do we maximize and sustain that true support?

The Commissioners responded to community pressure, for one of the first times in memory, and put an issue on the ballot that was initiated by the constituency. How important is this precedent?
JR: You can’t even measure that. It is unprecedented. I think this is a lesson for the future as we look to do things differently here. Groups that work collaboratively on a single mission or cause can have hope for success.
TS: This was watched by a lot of people outside of the region. I had calls from Phoenix’s Flynn Foundation that are looking to do a similar process to bring the arts and culture community together. I got a call from the Cincinnati Business Committee about what we learned, and how they might be able to work in unison with us and other metro areas. I heard from Wayne Lawson [Executive Director] of the Ohio Arts Council who said "What an amazing accomplishment, keep going."
CC: In order to reduce cynicism in general, there really needs to be public discussion about spending in our communities. When we try to skirt public discussion, it increases disengagement. This is an example of extensive engagement...
JR: Hundreds of meetings...and an open and accountable process...
CC: And this needs to be about how big dollar decisions and big resource decisions get made in this community.

They did put it on the ballot, however, many people feel the Commissioners did not actively support or campaign for 31. Why do you think this was, and how do you feel it affected the outcome?
JR: I don’t agree.
CC: One was running for re-election [Tim McCormack], and Peter [Lawson Jones] was highly visible, and he was also the spokesman, and Jimmy [Dimora] was out there stumping for this. Let’s be clear, there was a choice about who the spokespeople would be for this campaign. Polls said that people have a big level of skepticism from public officials. [Councilmen Joe] Cimperman [Matt] Zone, [Jay] Westbrook were critical on this. You never saw a politician in one of our ads. It was headed up as a community driven process, with the visible spokespeople such as Tom Shorgl, John Colm, Steve Minter, Barbara Robinson, Terri Hamilton Brown, Dean Gladden, Art Falco, Near West Theatre, Cleveland Public Theatre, Mikelann Rensel of Cleveland Neighborhood Development Corporation, also Mayor Longo, head of the Mayors & Managers Association, who endorsed us within 6 days of it being confirmed on the ballot. Longo went to two editorial boards with us and gave speeches.

I think this is the first conversation in weeks that hasn't brought up the name of Peter B. Lewis as a possible solution to every problem...
CC: I think it would have been great to have him. We would have welcomed direct support from Peter B. Lewis because we felt that this was very much in keeping with what he said the community should do. A tremendously collaborative effort that specifically would have strengthened University Circle, where he said his priorities lie. I hope he will be engaged next time around.

A year ago, the arts community vigorously campaigned for Issue 15 Health & Human Services, in response to the Commissioners request for help. Do you feel the arts community got the support and respect it deserved on Issue 31 for those efforts last year?

TS: There wouldn’t have been an Issue 31 without Issue 15. It was a first step in proving that the arts and culture community could organize around an issue. I think the community certainly helped pass this, they put it on the ballot, they raised money, they helped stump for it. When you hear Peter Lawson Jones say this isn’t over and that we’ll find another way to make this happen, it means they will target it again. I don’t think public officials say this unless they are impressed with the cause and the people who are behind it - the volunteers, etc.

JR: You can’t do a side-by-side comparison. Issue 31 shared campaigning space [with Issue 30 for Health & Human Services, which passed], Cecelia Huffman worked on both campaigns, the fundraising was done. The County raised on the level of $125k from the County campaign [for Issue 31].
TS: I can tell you that Bill Denihan, Executive Director of the Mental Health Board, one of the largest County departments, and Mike Thomas, former board chair, Director of The Citizens League, said it was worth the effort, as well as Lee Fisher from The Center for Families & Children, John Begala of the Federation for Community Planning, and Mike Benz of United Way - they all benefitted from 15, and they all recognized what we do together and they supported Issue 31. And had it passed, they could have benefitted from 31 in terms of project support.

There has been talk of creating a cultural district [RACD - Regional Arts and Cultural District] that can levy taxes on its own to support Cleveland’s arts community. How would that work?
TS: It’s a cultural taxing district. It would utilize Ohio revised code from the general assembly to establish a Cuyahoga county-wide cultural district with an independent board that would be commissioner-appointed.

What could a cultural district do?
TS: They could make grants to support arts, do cultural activities, and fund organizations and projects.

Would a cultural district be able to levy a tax?
TS: They can put forward a property tax initiative.

Would a cultural district be able to raise money with any other kind of levy besides property tax?
TS: Not at this point.
JR: The simplest way to do this is to go to Columbus to get the legislation changed and remove the requirement that the county must have a municipality over 500K [to create a RACD], and Cleveland is only at 490K.

What are some other options for how public funding in our region might be achieved?
JR: Partner with NASA for signage on the space shuttle. I’m dreaming big here.
TS: There’s lots of taxes that generate a dedicated revenue stream. That’s what we’re going to be looking at.

What else did we learn?
TS: I hope the arts & culture sector from boards to volunteers stay engaged in this discussion. Even those folks who had questions, take a little different view of the future. Look at the solutions and create our own solutions.

You guys have been working really hard for months on this campaign. What did you do when election day finally came?
CC: I slept 28 hours.

More information can be found at http://www.SupportArtsAndCulture.com and http://www.Issue31.org

Now that you're done, Return to the current issue. (:divend:)