Financial component to be nailed down at future meeting

LAURIE WEIR

Arts and culture took centre stage during a recent committee of the whole meeting of Smiths Falls council.

Julia Crowder, manager of economic development and tourism sought approval from the committee that they move forward with the Public Arts Master Plan and pass a bylaw to adopt a Public Arts Policy as well as direct staff to establish a new Public Arts Advisory Committee.

The idea is to create public art in Smiths Falls – like murals in key locations – and develop cultural experiences.

The cost to develop community public art tools and guidance was $5,000 and funded through the 2023 operational budget, Crowder noted in her report. The plan recommends that dedicated funds be allocated to support new public art initiatives and future maintenance through the establishment of a Public Arts Reserve and suggests an annual allocation of up to one per cent of the tax-generated revenues, or as high as $190,000.

Coun. Jennifer Miller suggested they defer approving the recommendation.

“I had some high hopes for an actual action plan, so we knew what we were going to do with our arts community,” Miller said, as they move into the 2025 budget discussions, “we can include it and not defer it by another year because we don’t have concrete plans.”

Crowder said that would be part of what the committee would do as first actions – to compile a list of public art as well as suggest some short- and long-term projects. “Part of those consultations will be more public consultations.”

Coun. Peter McKenna suggested researching public art in municipalities and what that art can do.

“It brings (communities) to life,” he said.

McKenna said without the plan he would be without the guidance he would need come budget time to make the financial decisions. He said he would also like to have more say on what gets donated or have “a nice way to say no thanks … or find another purpose for it.”

Crowder said updating the donations policy is another action item of the committee.

Coun. Jay Brennan said the amount of work on the file is great so far, but he’s concerned about the cost, and how they came up with the figure.

“We looked at best practices in other communities,” Crowder said. “Most communities are reserving one per cent of their budget to public art. It’s not just about the projects themselves. It’s the maintenance of the projects for the long term.”

Crowder added they don’t have to put one per cent, or $190,000 into a reserve fund but they could come to council each year with their ask in a line item.

“Art isn’t cheap, and the maintenance of art is not inexpensive,” Crowder said.

Brennan said he’d like to see the list of other communities that have art installations. “I know art isn’t cheap. Streets aren’t cheap either,” he said. “I’m for the arts, but I’m not supporting the one per cent … I don’t think that number fits the fiscal reality that we’re facing or the taxpayers.”

Coun. Chris McGuire said the one per cent funding was a good number, “but it’s got to come from grants … it needs to be coming from the tourism and economic development funding because I don’t see us raising taxes by one per cent to cover the plan. It’s good to have it. Hopefully, we can get this stuff moving because I think we’re behind other communities in using public art to create more vibrant public spaces.”

Crowder said the funds could “certainly come out of our budget but the budget would have to increase. Currently, we have $93,000 for tourism development within the town. The chamber currently gets $45,000 of that so almost half the budget is already allocated.”

Which leaves $38,000 to go to tourism marketing “and other things we’re trying to increase and develop more fulsome,” Crowder said.

Bottom line, they’d still have to come back to council to seek funding to support these projects, she said.

Mayor Shawn Pankow said it was a solid foundational document.

“We’ve all been supportive of public art and beautifying our community,” he said, as he was reluctant to commit to a one per cent tax increase.

“We have to have some money there if we are going to leverage grants,” Pankow said. “There’s not much sense of having a policy without having some funding attached to it. It’s not going to work without a commitment. We know it’s well supported by the community. We’ve all been to places where we’ve been inspired by what we see in public art.”

Pankow said it’s a big step forward, but if they removed the funding allocation at this stage and deferred it a month to have a more fulsome discussion, he could support it.

Are there good sources of revenue to offset this and where would they come from, he asked. “I suspect there are, but I don’t know where they would come from,” he said. “But I also recognize that we can’t do something with nothing.”

Crowder noted that the funding portion was “up to” one per cent, but that was up to council to decide on a figure.

Chief administrative officer Malcolm Morris said if they wanted to move forward with the committee formulation then the rest of the recommendation could be scaled.

If council is in agreement with the principle, then the financial piece could be worked on, Morris indicated, “and that’s subject to annual council budget approval.”

“We need to get started,” the CAO said, and maybe a “scaled-down version” would be appropriate at this time “for whatever comfort level you have.”

McKenna, who chaired the meeting, said this was the vision they wished to achieve. “It’s a long-term master plan. There will be more discussion to come.”

Councillors agreed to move forward on a plan to create the advisory committee but leave the financial component to a later date for further discussion.