Today and tomorrow are collectively known as Arts Advocacy Day. Today about 400 arts organizations converged on DC to learn about how to lobby their representatives. Tomorrow they have meetings with their reps and 2 actors are addressing Congress (Jeff Daniels and Kyle McLachlan I think). So there are all sorts of related workshops and lectures over the two days. We hosted one at the KC that was put on by Americans for the Arts - it is strange, all these organizations that don't exist in Canada, largely because our funding structure is so different. Americans for the Arts in a not for profit that advocates for the arts in America (go figure). But there is controversy with them as of course not everyone agrees with their priorities and methods etc. In fact, I find it so strange and almost alienating that arts groups need to learn how to lobby independently and collectively, to the point where there is a day put aside every year to teach just that. Maybe we can learn from this though. Certainly, I feel the arts in Canada could be more articulate in its approach and more united nationally rather than regionally - I mean I think in Toronto we're pretty good at gathering together to fight the good fight when necessary.
Anyway, the event tonight was a key note lecture by Joseph P. Riley Jr. who is the mayor of Charleston, South Carolina. He has been re-elected 9 times and has served as mayor for 35 years.
He is awesome.
His vision for urban revitalization and renewal is astounding. The idea that the public housing you build doesn't have to be ugly - it can be designed to fit in with a neighbourhood, not stand out from it. Parking garages don't have to be ugly either. How saving one building can save an entire neighbourhood. I wish everyone running for mayor in Toronto could have seen this speech. For me, it was also nice to be involved in a discourse that wasn't around the performing arts. This was about creating and building a community - which of course we try to do as well but differently - how the health of your neighbourhoods directly affect the health of your city, and how important it is to preserve your downtown core through mixed use. Opening up your waterfront (or other natural feature) for public use improves quality of life.
I mean, what he was saying was just common sense, not rocket science, but no one seems to say it! Urban planners too often reject something because it would involve increasing a sidewalk by 2 feet and that might lead to a problem if you happened to have an illegally parked delivery van which would then be blocking the through traffic. People don't think outside the box enough. David Crombie, years ago in Toronto, used many of these same ideas when revitalizing the St. Lawrence Market area, but it's thinking that seems to have been lost in our city.
I've been to Charleston, but it was likely 25 years ago (OMG typing that is frightening). I'd love to get down there and see how it's changed.
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