Massachusetts Artists Leaders Coalition

Artists leaders and artist-run groups addressing policy issues that affect artists in Massachusetts

Governor’s Budget Cuts Funding for the Arts, Humanities & Sciences

This week, Governor Baker released his FY2021 budget proposal. Despite the final FY2020 budget funding the Massachusetts Cultural Council at $18M — a 12% increase, and the highest appropriation of funds the MCC has received since 2002 — Gov. Baker’s FY2021 recommendation cuts their funding by nearly 9.5%.

Here’s an excerpt from the press release MCC released on Tuesday:

The Governor’s budget for the coming fiscal year proposes an investment of $16.3M for the arts, humanities, and sciences through the Mass Cultural Council. The Agency is disappointed … and cautions that this $1.7M funding reduction will lead to broad cuts in agency services and programs in the coming fiscal year.

We note that the Governor’s proposal is in line with his previous spending plans. In FY20 Governor Baker recommended an investment of $16.1M in the arts, humanities, and sciences; however, due to the passionate advocacy and support from our partners MASSCreative, Mass Humanities, Mass Artists Leaders Coalition, and thousands of advocates statewide, the final FY20 state budget enacted by the Legislature actually funded Mass Cultural Council at $18,180,000, a high water mark for the Agency’s operating budget in recent times.

You can read the full MCC press release here:
https://massculturalcouncil.org/blog/governors-budget-cuts-funding-for-the-arts-humanities-sciences/

Keep up with the state budget process here:
https://malegislature.gov/Budget/GovernorsBudget

Here are some next steps from MCC:

  • Use MASSCreative‘s Action Alert to email your legislators letting them know how important funding for arts and culture is and urge them not to cut the Mass Cultural Council budget.
  • We anticipate Mass Cultural Council will soon be invited to testify at a Joint Hearing of the House and Senate Committees on Ways & Means to provide feedback on the Governor’s FY21 spending recommendation.
  • The House Committee on Ways & Means traditionally releases its budget recommendations in early April; the House of Representatives FY21 budget debate will likely take place during the week of April 27th.
  • The Senate Committee on Ways & Means traditionally releases its budget recommendations in early May; the Senate FY21 budget debate will likely take place during the week of May 18th.