The Office of Arts and Culture, and obviously our strategic goals as outlined in our um twenty thirty plan as they relate to creative placemaking, placekeeping, public art, and um workforce development.

So the two projects that we will be presenting today are to bring a new public artwork to the Westside Regional Park Community Center grounds and to launch a public art on city infrastructure, infrastructure and artist professional development pilot program.

And so why, as mentioned, it's an opportunity to advance numerous strategic goals.

It allows us to expand where public art lives in the city, um, bring new artists to Frederick, and support our local artist and development as well as youth career engage opportunities.

Um the new public artwork on Westside Regional Park Community Center grounds has a proposed budget of a hundred and eighty-two thousand dollars.

Um, it will be a freestanding public artwork.

And then the utility box and professional development program has a proposed budget of six to eight thousand dollars, and we are expecting ten to fifteen small scale public artworks and a cohort of local artists to be equipped with um public art skill set.

Um, and early community feedback from the design and community engagement process.

Um, the city has um, I believe about ninety, a little over ninety total utility boxes in the city, and so this project could serve as a pilot for a broader program.

Yes.

Yes, that's a key point.

The orange circles represent ideal locations identified for the new public artwork.

And most ideally the larger circle that's closer to the roads, so it becomes a real identifying point for the center and the park as well.

Last fall we participated in the public meetings for the draft design and received feedback from the community about what they would like to see.

And the top possible themes that came out of that were cultural diversity and representation, environmental and natural themes, inclusivity, and local inspiration.

Frederick Arts Council will conduct a national open call following best practices, and Luis will share more details about that.

And we welcome your thoughts and feedback as well.

And the installation of the artwork will align with the construction schedule for this phase.

Go ahead, Louise.

So we've been using a process for selecting public artists for a long time now, and it's based on national best practices.

We have a public art committee of the Frederick Arts Council that is comprised of board members but also working artists in our community.

And we make sure that there's a curatorial overlay.

So when they're making a decision, they have professional curatorial input.

And then they they select the top three and then their first choice.

And then they propose that to the property owner, which in this case is the city, and of course the city has the right to ask for the next selection if they don't like the selection that was proposed.

And it's been working well.

We're um working with Middletown now on a 15-foot sculpture on their main street.

Um as you know, we've done a lot of murals in town, like the Lester Bowie mural, and so it's a tried and true selection process, and um we're really thrilled to be working on this important um landmark piece for the West part of town.

Yeah.

If you have any questions, so I know for first hand experience the fabrication costs can be really, really high.

Is there an expectation of the city or the contractor to um prep the site?

And so that's not included in the artwork purchase.

Is it just the artwork?

Um we so we had discussed that in um some of the meetings and preparation.

I think there might be an opportunity where we could do that.

Um, but I it's not 100% confirmed.

Um, but ideally we would be able to allocate some funds to help prep the location prior to obviously the installation.

And hopefully this would, yeah, and hopefully that could be part of the budget.

But I think it's great, especially if it's three-dimensional, to um to to select and design as the building's going up rather than an afterthought that you're gonna have a lot more cohesiveness, and then it's so much easier to do site prep before the site's finished.

So I applaud that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um, go ahead.

Okay, great.

So now we can go over the um a little bit more details about the utility box art of the public infrastructure pilot programs.

So our goal would be to roll this out starting in the fall.

And again, we'll be able to bring 10 to 15 new small-scale artworks across the city with a particular focus on areas that are public art deserts.

So we would be avoiding the downtown um part of the city essentially.

Um, and it will engage both a teaching artist and a trainee.

Um, and the teaching artists will be selected via an open call that FAC will develop and advertise with the support of the city, and then in collaboration with the Office of Opportunity and Innovation, we plan to advertise the professional development opportunity through schools and open it up to youth ages 18 to 24.

And um the tension is for the art to be created by residents and reflect the areas in which they're from.

Do you have a question, Councilmember Shock?

No, I'll wait till you finish.

Okay.

Um I'll just add that paying the trainees removes barriers to entry and aligns with the mayor's priorities, um, the opportunities are paid.

And in addition to creative um creating creative pathways to the public art field for local artists who are seeking to enter the field.

Um the program provides opportunities to build other skills for trainees, including public speaking, design development, and more.

And um finally, I um we are sorry, we're working closely with the Department of Public Works to identify which utility boxes are appropriate to use, um, but data from other cities with similar programs and in conversation with DPW, um, we plan to wrap the boxes and not paint them.

And this will allow for easier planning installation and replacement.

And we also um expect based on data from other cities that that will help reduce graffiti and therefore um DPW staff time to address the kinds of issues.