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Both the U.S. Senate and U.S. House have returned to their work in Washington, DC in a “lame duck session” following an election. Current reporting indicates that despite the spiking COVID-19 rates, and the year-end conclusion to many of the relief programs they approved in March, leaders in Congress are not currently negotiating another phase of federal relief.

According to Americans for the Arts , arts organizations have seen over $14.5 billion in economic loss this year, 2/3 of artists and creatives workforce are unemployed and creativity-based income loss has reached $50.6 billion. In just over forty days, on 12/31/20, provisions that provide unemployment eligibility to gig workers, charitable deductibility for all taxpayers, and state/local government relief funds all end . In California, arts, culture and entertainment industry suffers from one of the highest unemployment rates with one-third of our sector out of work. That is more than 450,000 jobs and an estimate $45 billion in accumulative economic loss.

If you haven’t contacted your member of Congress to inform them of how the pandemic is impacting your community, job and livelihood, please take two minutes to use this customizable E-Alert to do so. Please also share if the CARES act funds you’ve received to date have helped you until now. It is important to show federal relief funds are necessary and being used to maintain jobs and programs.

Also for our state case making, please be sure to fill out our surveys. They are now available in Spanish too.

Finally, if you are interested to learn how to pitch your story to best make your case to media and policymakers please join us for a free media training on Thursday, November 19 at 3pm .

If you are also interested to support a statewide arts awareness campaign, sign up today to receive our free toolkit .

We are here for you. If you have questions or need support to navigate your next steps in advocacy for the arts sector, please contact us!

1. Tell Congress the arts need relief.
2. Take our media training webinar: Learn how to pitch your story to best make your case to media and policymakers.
3. Join our Statewide Arts Awareness Campaign during the week of December 7.
4. Hold your elected officials accountable. Contact your new or re-elected local officials including your school board members. Introduce yourself and your work, ask for the staffer in charge of the arts portfolio. Ask them what are their plans for the sustainability of the arts in your community and offer that you can be a resource.
5. Take 10 minutes to complete our statewide survey. We need current data to build our case for funding. SURVEY CLOSES NOVEMBER 24. Now available in Spanish.

INDIVIDUALS: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/CFTACovidIndividuals    SPANISH: https://es.surveymonkey.com/r/CFTACovidIndEsp 
ORGANIZATIONS: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/CFTACovidOrgs     SPANISH: https://es.surveymonkey.com/r/CFTACovidOrgEsp

Californians for the Arts (CFTA) is a highly effective non-partisan statewide arts advocacy organization whose mission is to ensure the opportunity for all people to have access to and involvement in the arts and to build public awareness of the value and impact of arts, culture and creativity in California. We serve to organize, inform, and connect the California arts community to be a unified and effective voice for arts advocacy. As a 501c3, your personal contribution is tax deductible and helps support a full-time Executive Director and programs to serve the field.

California Arts Advocates (CAA), as a 501c4, directly lobbies for funds for the arts and creative sector and works on legislation to protect artists and arts organizations. In addition to supporting policy development and direct lobbying actions, CAA membership dues also help pay for our lobbyist — and we have one of the top Sacramento lobbying firms working on our behalf!