Since 2007, Denise Kowal has invited chalk artists from around the world to Sarasota to create temporary images on downtown streets and at the Venice Airport for the annual Avenida de Colores Chalk Festival. Each year, thousands gather to watch the artists at work and to feel like they’re stepping into other worlds in some of the many finished 3-D images.
She’s planning some new international features when the festival returns to downtown Sarasota Nov. 8-10 after several years in Venice, but it will likely be a private and ticketed event after the Sarasota County Commission vetoed a roughly $40,000 grant from the country’s tourist tax collections earmarked for the arts.
Commissioners voted earlier this month to approve $2.1 million in grants for 35 arts groups only after removing the Chalk Festival, Embracing Our Differences and community radio station WSLR from the funding list.
Leaders of Embracing our Differences (which is losing a $46,696 grant) and WSLR/Fogartyville Community Media and Arts Center ($27,000) said they were disappointed but not surprised by what they considered a politically motivated decision.
For Kowal, however, it was an unexpected “gut punch. We’ve qualified for funding for over 15 years.”
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Kowal said the Chalk Festival already was struggling to make up a loss of about $150,000 from 2022 when the festival in Venice was canceled due to Hurricane Ian after artists were already in town.
“People think our event is really reasonable because we’re on the street and using chalk,” Kowal said. “They have no understanding of how expensive the chalk is, or the cost of lodging and flights for the artists. We spend about $200,000 each year.”
After losing the county grant, she said the organization plans to sell admission tickets for $20 or less in advance of the festival (probably double at the gate) to cover the lost funding and the extra $10,000 it must pay the city of Sarasota for use of the street during the exhibition.
“I’ve reached out to our donors and would-be donors,” she said. “We’re always fundraising, but it’s painful when those funds are just going to make up for our losses from the county and the city, instead of a donation going to the cost of supplies for some of our artists.”
For Embracing Our Differences, an annual exhibit of 50 billboard-size posters and accompanying inspirational quotations that promote harmony, diversity and inclusion, volunteers “stepped up with a $25,000 challenge. That’s absolutely phenomenal,” said Executive Director Sarah Wertheimer. “We have had many people from the community stepping up to meet that challenge.”
Wertheimer said “the public has been overwhelmingly supportive and that’s what makes this that much more disheartening.”
She said commissioners are “not taking their constituents into consideration because we have widespread support from the community.”
Commissioners were not specific in the reasoning for rejecting funding for the three organizations, but they did express concerns about how outdoor events like Embracing Our Differences and the Chalk Festival could monitor how many people were attending.
Embracing Our Differences also lost an expected $60,947 state grant when Gov. Ron DeSantis vetoed all arts and culture grants in June, creating a $107,643 for the organization with a $1.6 million budget.
Jesse Coleman, general manager of WSLR and Fogartyville, said the organization is communicating “the loss to our listeners and participants and asking them to express their displeasure to the commissioners. We have been getting an outpouring of support.”
What are the tourist tax grants for?
For more than 25 years years, non-profit arts and culture organizations have shared in a portion of a one-half percent tax on tourist stays in Sarasota County. The grants were initially established to help those organizations expand their programming to add more events that might further increase tourism, particularly outside the traditional winter snowbird season.
This year, the collections totaled $2.1 million. The money cut is being reallocated to the other organizations.
“I’m happy that our loss will at least help the other arts organizations have a stronger season,” Kowal said.
Coleman said the commission’s vote was “a little nonsensical to me. I can’t understand if the goal of these programs is to increase tourism in the area and strengthen the arts fabric on the cultural coast, why would we try to limit the number of programs that benefit from them? It seems counterintuitive to the stated goal.”
Fogartyville presents live music and community discussions, and hosted more than 60 ticketed events last year, Coleman said. The radio station is about 60% music and 40% public affairs programming.
He said when commissioners altered some of the criteria for the new grant applications last winter, the station got word “that we were going to be a target” because WSLR “supports diversity, equity and inclusion and is open to all people of all walks of life. I think that is ultimately what is going on here.”
Kowal said she was counting on the county grant to support even more international visitors for this year’s festival.
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“I’ve worked for 10 years to bring, for the first time in the history of the United States, a delegation of Flower Carpet artists to our city. It’s the first time in the whole country that delegations of Flower Carpet artists are congregating at one festival.”
Flower carpets are large-scale designs covered in flowers. Kowal said she will be a judge for the Madonnari 50th Anniversary Competition in Grazie di Curtatone, Italy in August.
“This is a really big deal with this art form,” she said. “Everybody involved in this art form knows this is happening in Sarasota in November.”
What are other groups getting from Sarasota County's tourist tax grants?
Here is a list of what grants were approved for 35 other arts and culture organizations after the rejected funds were reallocated.
Architecture Sarasota, $35,879
Art Center Sarasota, $49,333
Artist Series Concerts of Sarasota, $49,333
Asolo Repertory Theatre, $95,925
Chamber Orchestra of Sarasota, $3,488
Choral Artists of Sarasota, $41,114
Circus Arts Conservatory, $95,925
Englewood Art Center, $8,970
ensembleNEWSRQ, $11,537
Florida Studio Theatre, $95,925
Hermitage Artist Retreat, $54,815
Jazz Club of Sarasota, $44,848
Key Chorale, $43,852
Marie Selby Botanical Gardens, $95,925
La Musica Chamber Music Festival, $19,933
Mote Marine Laboratory, $86,333
Perlman Music Program/Suncoast, $44,848
Pops Orchestra, $24,916
Ringling Museum, $95,925
Rise Above Performing Arts, $38,370
Sarasota Art Museum, $85,959
Sarasota Ballet of Florida, $95,925
Sarasota Concert Association, $49,333
Sarasota Contemporary Dance, $44,005
Sarasota Cuban Ballet School, $49,333
Sarasota Film Festival, $4,848
Sarasota Opera, $95,925
Sarasota Orchestra, $95,925
Sarasota Players, $43,852
Urbanite Theatre, $49,333
Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall, $95,925
Venice Art Center, $43,852
The Venice Symphony, $86,333
Venice Theatre, $86,333
Westcoast Black Theatre Troupe, $95,925
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