Chair staff is ready when you are good afternoon and welcome to the Monday November 3rd, 2025, 1 p.m.

meeting of the Arts, Culture, and Creative Economy Commission.

The meeting is now called to order.

Will the clerk please call roll to establish a quorum?

Thank you, Chair.

Commissioners, please unmute for roll call.

Commissioner Smith.

Commissioner Eisenberg?

Here.

Commissioner O'Habu?

Here.

Commissioner Wallace.

Here.

Commissioner Anderson.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Um.

Commissioner Chocolino.

So absent.

Commissioner Winlock.

Here.

Commissioner Hershey.

Here.

Commissioner Roscoe.

Absolutely.

And Commissioner Carter?

Here.

And Chair Lovulo.

Here.

Thank you.

We have quorum.

Thank you.

Um I'd like to remind members of the public in chambers that if you would like to speak on the agenda item, please turn in a speaker slip before the item begins.

After the item is called, we will no longer accept speaker slips.

You'll have two minutes to speak once you are called on.

We will now proceed with today's agenda.

Let's see.

Okay, we go.

Please stand for the land acknowledgement.

To the original people of this land, the Nissanan people, the Southern Maidu Valley and Plains Miwak, Patwin Windtoon peoples, and the people of the Wilton Rancheria, Sacramento's only federally recognized tribe.

May we acknowledge and honor the native people who came before us and still walk beside us today on these ancestral lands by choosing to gather together today in the active practice of acknowledgement and appreciation for Sacramento's Indigenous Peoples History Contributions and Lives.

Thank you.

Please remain standing for the Pledge of Allegiance.

She is our youth appointee commissioner seat.

And then we have here our new commissioner for District Five, right?

And that's Douglas Dino Carter.

Would you like to say anything?

Introduce yourself or hello everyone.

I am a District 5, Arts, Culture, and Economic Commissioner.

That is the Katie Maple area of Sacramento, sort of Oak Park area, and I'm very thankful to be here with you guys today.

Thank you.

Welcome.

Welcome in.

Our next item that we will move to is our consent calendar.

Clerk, are there any members of the public who wish to speak on the consent calendar?

Thank you, Chair.

There are no speakers for this item.

Are there any commissioners who wish to speak on this item?

Yes, Maya.

I'd like to make the motion to approve.

I can't unmute myself.

I'd like to make a motion to approve the minutes.

Thank you.

We've got one.

Do we got a second?

Second.

I'll do the whole consent calendar.

Is that what you meant?

Yep.

Second.

Okay, thank you.

That was a motion by Commissioner Wallace, but the second by Commissioner Eisenberg.

Okay.

Chair, would you like to do the voice vote or the roll call?

Let's do.

Let's do a voice vote.

All those in favor to pass this motion say aye.

All those or any opposed?

Any abstain?

The motion passes with opposition from no commissioners and abstention from no commissioners.

Thank you.

We'll now proceed on to our discussion calendar.

With the first item being everyday creative program update.

Actually, I think that was very good from this calendar.

We heard that sound.

There's someone into this.

Alright, actually, that has been moved to another calendar date and will be discussed at a later date.

Let's go to item four, which is creative growth fellowship program.

Okay, hopefully this works.

And good afternoon, members of the commission.

My name's Melissa Serone.

I'm the grants and programs manager at the Office of Arts and Culture.

And I'm really happy to be here today to share with you the outcome of our Creative Growth Fellowship Fund for Individual Artists.

For those of you who've been on the commission for the last year or more, you know this has been a long time coming.

And for those of you who are new to the commission, I look forward to sharing with you our path, where we started, and how we got here.

So I'll start with the program background.

As a reminder, the Creative Growth Fellowship Fund was made possible by American Rescue Plan Act or ARPA funds allocated by City Council to the Office of Arts and Culture to mitigate the effects of the COVID 19 pandemic on our cultural community.

In addition to using these funds to support nonprofit organizations, creative businesses, and arts journalism, it was important for us to devote significant funds to support individual artists.

Outside of our 2021 seating creativity grant, the Office of Arts and Culture has not had the ability to support this vital part of the artistic landscape in such a substantial way.

So this was an opportunity to ensure that we were investing in the core of our creative community, which is our artist.

Originally, the program was going to be crafted as a guaranteed income program where artists would apply and be funded based primarily on their income level.

Artists below a certain income for their household would automatically be added to a lottery, and 200 individuals would be randomly chosen.

As part of that process, artists would remain anonymous and they would receive monthly payments for one year.

So we did some extensive research, both in our community with artists and with other national arts focused GBI programs.

We also got feedback from City Council about this approach.

So after weighing our options, we decided to pivot to a fellowship program, which this commission then approved in October of 2024.

So here is where we landed.

We decided to keep the monthly stipends for artists, and so rather than providing one lump sum, we would still provide $850 a month for a year for 200 artists.

That's a total of 10,200 per individual or $2,040,000 going directly to artists.

So if you are an artist or culture bearer in one of the eligible disciplines, and I'm going to review those in a minute, if you're over the age of 18 and you could demonstrate residency in Sacramento at the time of submitting the application, you were automatically eligible to apply.

We did want to create a process that was going to be as inclusive as possible and be relevant to a broad population.

Unlike the GBI program, there would be no income requirements.

We only asked income information in the demographic section, but this was not used for selection.

And most importantly, if you were selected, the artists could use the funds to support whatever helps them advance their work.

So it could be used for art supplies, space rental, materials, but it also could be just used to pay themselves and support their basic living needs.

As part of the program design, we implemented a peer review panel process as we do in most of our other competitive grant programs.

And in your packet, you're going to find a copy of the guidelines that includes the application questions.

So applications were reviewed and scored on a scale of one to 100 in three areas: commitment to practice, artistic merit, and public benefit.

So as I said earlier, we don't often fund individual artists here in the city.

The contracting requirements can be really difficult to meet, and they create an added expense for artists to receive funds from us.

To directly fund 200 artists, the city would have needed to enter into contracts with 200 individuals, obtain business operating certificates, vendor information from each, and then create 200 monthly invoices for 12 months or 2400 unique invoices.

Also, the city's financial systems are designed to pay by check or by direct deposit to a bank account, which might not be available to all artists.

And it would be almost impossible to guarantee that all awardees would reliably receive a check on the first of every month.

And it was really important for us to have a regular payment that people knew was going to be coming on the first of the month.

So it's just not the way our processes are set up.

So in the beginning, we knew we wanted to work with an organization that could provide a user-friendly grant portal for applications to apply in and an automated payment process.

So we put out a request for proposals for these services, and we're really fortunate enough to contract with AidKit, who's been a fantastic partner in this work.

So AidKit is an end-to-end platform that helps governments and other nonprofits manage programs at scale.

They create a customized, excuse me, application.

They have built-in fraud protection and security.

They provide multiple secure payment options and they have experience in this type of work, having provided more than $300 million in aid to hundreds of organizations.

They also provide a mobile app so that applicants can use their phone to apply, which is really a great benefit for artists who don't have access to laptops, and they track impact in real time with built-in reports and dashboards.

And really important to us, they're mission-driven.

They have a focus on delivering aid with dignity, efficiency, and equity, and they've been really supportive of our process.

And there's a photo of the entire Aid Kit team.

We haven't worked with all of them, but they have been so supportive and adaptive to our needs.

And if you look at the very bottom row on the carpet, the third from the left, I want to shout out to Rui Wu, who's been our ongoing contact and been fantastic to work with.

So really happy about that process.

As I said earlier, we wanted to support artists in a wide variety of artistic disciplines, and they include much of what we consider falling within the basket of the creative economy, craft, dance, design, film, literary arts, music, oral traditions, social practice, theater, performance art, traditional arts, visual arts, and interdisciplinary arts.

There might be fields that you think of as part of the creative economy that maybe just don't fit into those buckets, but we really wanted to capture the most essential creative fields, knowing that we had limited resources, limited funds, and a lot of people that were going to fall in those categories.

So I want to spend a little time talking about outreach because I believe this is the most critical piece of our work, and we were able to try some new engagement strategies with this program.

I'm going to go into a little about all of our approaches, including some of our community partnerships, marketing strategies, translation services, webinars, and events.

So we worked closely with the city's community engagement team who helped us get the word out to constituencies throughout the city, and they allowed us to present at their city connect neighborhood events.

I was also able to attend a meeting of the city's community ambassadors program to present on this program.

And for those of you who don't know about the city resource, community ambassadors is a program of the city's neighborhood development action team that creates a bridge between the city and its diverse neighborhoods and partners.

So individuals who are already active in their communities apply annually to be an ambassador and help to lead outreach.

And these folks were great in getting the word out.

Not only did they share information about the fellowship, they also helped to translate materials for their communities.

They did radio and podcast presentations, and two of the ambassadors even used some of their own outreach stipend to help get the word out using flyers in their communities.

I really can't say enough about the work of this vital resource at City Hall.

And I encourage everybody to learn more about the program.

Consider applying or talk to your friends about applying for future opportunities to be an ambassador.

They really are an asset to our work.

We also put out a call for community-based organizations who could help us reach new audiences and neighborhoods or cultural communities that have been underserved by our programs.

We wanted to reach artists who don't come to our website or newsletter for information and maybe don't have any connection to city government.

We also wanted to reach an audience for whom language might be a barrier.

So we contracted with two organizations, Indie Things Possible and Everyday Impact Consulting to help support us in this work.

So individually, they each provided virtual and in-person grant writing workshops.

They did one-on-one meetings to help folks navigate the application, upload their materials, just really hands-on support.

They brought in their own speakers.

I think Indie Things Possible brought in Paul Willis a couple of times to, you know, do outreach to the hip hop community in the city, and they really personalized the process.

They provided translation, their trusted resource in their communities, and they spread the word out to this opportunity to new audiences.

And I really think this helped us reach a broader audience.

And here I've listed a few things that they did.

They all did more than this, but everyday impact engaged communities in a number of languages, they did multilingual outreach, and Indie Things Possible just really personalized everything in a way that didn't look like it was formal OAC or city government social media posts.

They did things in a different way that really I think was more engaging for communities.

So we also did our obviously our own marketing and outreach here at the city.

We really wanted to eliminate some of the language barriers that our programs have, and we tried to be proactive in providing at least a basic level of translation services in our marketing.

So flyers and social media posts were created and distributed in Spanish, Vietnamese, simplified in traditional Chinese and Tagalog.

The city's new language coordinator, again, another great resource, was instrumental in providing us with these translations and supported us in engaging professional language services to translate both the guidelines and application in Spanish.

And you'll see it in your packet.

The guidelines are there in Spanish as well.

And here are just two of the many social media posts that we did that really translates for different audiences.

We really did a wide social media push.

We created blog posts, appeared in television and radio interviews, anything to amplify our reach.

We created and posted online webinars, online resources, a QA email account, postcards, and we provided direct support to hundreds of potential applications.

So most of the work was done before the application was even open.

We wanted people to understand what the program was for, how to qualify, and to begin preparing their materials and asking for support in advance.

So we released the guidelines on May 1st, 2025, and the application opened a month later, June 2nd.

And it was only open until June 20th.

So the application wasn't very long, and the window for it to be open was short, but the marketing ahead of it and the preparation was quite long.

We didn't have any idea of how many applications we would be receiving.

Because many people don't apply till the last day or two, up until the deadline, we had to assemble a process based on an absolute unknown quantity.

So our panel pool needed to be very large and diverse, and then able to be whittled down in case we received fewer applications than we maybe had expected.

So we received qualified panelist applications from probably more than 50 individuals.

And the final panel included 25 artists and arts administrators, and that list is in your packet, and you'll really see the diverse experience they bring there from all over the country and all disciplines.

So the review period was originally set for about five weeks.

We did extend it another week to give them extra time to thoughtfully review.

Awards were announced on August 19th, and amazingly, the first payment went out on September 2nd, day after Labor Day.

So we did delay it one day, and the first payment was released, and we have three payments in the books already.

So the big unknown is how many applications did we receive by the deadline?

That was the one thing we weren't sure of.

And this is what we got.

When the application closed, we had 1,027 applications that were submitted into the portal.

So except for a number that were small number that were immediately eliminated because they had obvious residency issues or multiple submissions from the same person.

We were able to whittle those down.

But after that, we reviewed every application for basic eligibility by hand.

And from that number of 1027, we had 883 eligible applicants to go to panel review.

Now we've never had a panel review for grants of that volume until now.

And I just want to say I think that's a great indication of how many artists we have working here in Sacramento.

And obviously, you know we have 200 awards.

So I want to share some of the demographics information of just the applicants to see who applied.

In addition to what I'm going to show you, we also did demographics based on age, gender, and disability.

I have all that information if you're interested, but I wanted to highlight a few things to share with you today.

It might be a little bit hard to see, but it's probably not going to be too much of a surprise to you when we look at disciplines that the majority of applicants identify primarily as visual or music artists.

I think that's really indicative of the creative sector, not only here in Sacramento, but probably overall.

But you're also going to see a good number of other types of artists.

There is a wide, broad mix of disciplines under which people apply.

So you'll see literary arts was really strong, craft was really strong, interdisciplinary arts, and so their film also, so there really was a good cross-sector of disciplines that people applied under.

Artists also self-identified by race and ethnicity, and as you'll see, artists who identified as black or white were the majority of applicants with Hispanic artists also strongly represented.

In measuring demographics, we always want to go back and see how close this is to the demographics of the total Sacramento artistic population and see if there are any disparities.

And that really would speak, especially for applicants to outreach.

Do we want to do anything differently in the future in terms of how we reach our audiences?

But we do have a wide span of folks who did apply here.

And annual income, artists self-reported income as well, and it's really interesting to see that even though this program was not designed to differentiate by income, the majority of applicants reported incomes of less than 50,000 with more than half reporting incomes of less than 25,000, very similar to what you would see if you were doing a guaranteed basic income program.

And finally, zip codes, there's a breakdown of zip codes.

You'll see obviously there are some zip codes that are represented more strongly, but overall what you're going to see is a really wide range of zip.

So we had people from all over the city applying.

Okay, so the selection process was done in two parts after staff reviewed applications for eligibility, applications went to panel for review and scoring.

All the applications were scored, every one that we had in there that was eligible based on a rubric and from zero to 100.

So that was part one, score them just based on that one to zero to 100.

Then applicants with scores of 75 and above were put into a randomized lottery pool that was facilitated by AidKit.

So note that at this point we didn't have the names of the applicants and their scores, only their assigned number and their score.

So we didn't know who was going into this lottery pool.

So 375 applicants entered the lottery from which the final 200 were selected at random.

So once complete, applicants were notified of their status.

First payments were distributed, as I said, on September 2nd, and monthly stipends are going to continue through August 2026.

We collect this information for our turtle processes and reporting purposes, but I did want to give you a little bit of the demographics of the awardees and see how they matched up to who applied.

So primary discipline, what's interesting here is that music and visual arts are still the two primary disciplines under which people were getting the awards.

But there's now starting to be after visual a more even, slightly more even distribution.

You'll see more interdisciplinary artists, more literary artists, craft artists that were all receiving the awards as well.

Race and ethnicity, again, very similar across the categories.

You'll see there is a little bit more even with the Hispanic and the Black artists, white, self-identified.

So it's a slightly higher in the Hispanic artist category and everything, everything else stayed pretty much the same.

But again, you're seeing applicants who are awarded in all of these demographic categories.

Income similar with income, a majority of funds going to folks representing incomes of less than 25,000 a year, again, consistent with the GBI program result.

And zip codes, most of the same with a little wider representation, I think, than in the applicants, but again, across most zip codes.

So in your packet, you're going to see a list of the awardees.

And I'm sure that most of you are going to know several, if not many of the artists on this list.

But there's also going to be names that you've never seen before, which I think is really a good thing.

I want to emphasize that there were a lot of strong applicants who were not funded.

You've probably heard from folks who weren't funded and, you know, maybe were disappointed or surprised.

But I just want you to remember that 883 applications were reviewed, so less than 25% of qualified applicants received awards.

This is in no way an indication they weren't deserving an award or that their application wasn't really strong.

The pool was so large, and we had well prepared applications from all disciplines.

So I think this speaks to both the vibrancy of artistic community and their need for support.

So our aim moving forward is to find ways to continue to support Sacramento artists.

Overall, I think we satisfied many of the original goals for the program, serving a diverse pool of artists and culture bearers from all parts of the city in multiple disciplines, and supporting many artists with financial need.

Most are first-time recipients of grants from our office.

So what's next?

The funds are going out the door, the program's underway, but we know that this is one-time funding, and we want to be able to support this community moving forward.

So we're going to be providing some simple surveys to the funded artists and a couple of times throughout the award cycle to learn more about the impact that monthly payments are having on their work and their daily lives.

We want to document the impact so that the end of the program we're going to have some quantitative and qualitative data to share.

We'll also collect stories from participants from those who want to share their impact experiences because we know stories are valuable, and we can provide either video or audio support to help some of our folks talk about the work they're doing.

We want to provide professional development opportunities both to the recipients but also to the hundreds of other artists who applied, and maybe we're not selected.

We think there are valuable tools and workshops that can support them in their business development.

And we want to ensure that we're preparing the recipients for the time when their funding ends, encouraging them to use funds to invest in themselves and their practice in the best ways possible.

So we've got a couple of other ideas in the works for ways that we can share out some of their accomplishments.

But I am happy to answer any questions you might have or any comments.

Are there any members of the public who wish to speak on this item?

Thank you, Chair.

Yes, we have one speaker for this item.

Uh Lambert.

Yes, I would like to first start off by saying that, and I I just got back into Sacramento last night, but family and uh I have a tremendous millennial following, and they keep me busy.

I thought I was gonna be off today, but they said no, I'll come down here because there's somebody that's uh speaking who I'm very fond of, and that's uh Melissa Saron because why am I fond of her?

Because uh her and Megan, who are both of them really are icons in Del Paso Heights at Grant High School because the drum line, which gave me this hat, they told me that they helped them with funding for travel, food, and lodging.

And the Grant Drumline, I believe they just went to Ireland.

I'm not sure, I got to check on that.

But when they did that, that helped them.

They didn't have to their parents and grandparents didn't have to scuffle the money like they used to before these two type people came to City Hall.

They had tremendous uh difficulties getting money from the city manager's office, you know, until I came back home and start looking at it in a serious way, and then we started getting some movement because uh they pay a lot of taxes in Del Paso Heights too.

They own property, so this money is taxpayers' money, and also uh I forgot about it till my daughter told me that Melissa Saron and I actually share our birth date together.

And I would like to say happy belated birthday to her, and she knows when the date is.

I don't have to say it.

And so it's wonderful to hear that she's still in the mix because uh she thinks outside the box just like Megan.

Thank you for your comments, Chair.

There are no other speakers for this item.

Thank you.

Are there any commissioners who wish to speak on this item?

Um, Maya.

Or me.

Okay.

And then I think what I do want to see.

Okay.

Uh, I just really quickly want to commend uh Melissa and the staff.

Um, when I joined the arts commission many years ago, there was not as much of a robust outreach mechanism, and there was a lot of skepticism amongst the creative community about who got awards and why.

And I think that the diligence and the care that was been taken to make sure that this was a fair process helps restore a lot of trust in from the community.

And I just commend you and I hope to see that effort continue.

And then I'm really happy for the fact that we were able to convert these funds for this effort, and congratulations to all the recipients.

Thank you, Dr.

Winlock.

Thank you.

Boy, this is just outstanding, isn't it?

I mean, looking at our investment into our local artists and our creative economy.

My question is around the how do we know that putting this amount of dollars, we're talking two million dollars.

How are we going to determine that this was successful for us to do?

Because we probably should be duplicating this a number of times.

So Melissa, what what were the what are we seeing?

Are the what are the success indicators that we're going to be looking at?

Um well, obviously it's early, so we are going to be measuring as we move forward.

So we did some baseline questioning for folks when they were applying.

Um what are the re what are the uses you think you're going to put the money to?

Will it help you in terms of, you know, moving your work forward, just taking care of, you know, necessary bills that have been, you know, distracting you from doing your work, trying to find um a baseline for where people were when they applied for the grant.

And then we're going to be checking in with them periodically throughout the year through a sort of a more formal survey so that we can see how they're doing over this period of time, what they're accomplishing, um, what they're doing in their communities.

Are they having more time?

I've heard from folks who are maybe having a little bit more time to get out in the community and do more community work as a result of not having to, you know, make ends meet in such a difficult way.

So there's gonna be that, but I think we really want to delve into some good storytelling.

We want to bring folks together, um, we want to give them an opportunity to show us what you've produced.

Have you created new work?

Um, have you worked with new communities?

So we're gonna have opportunities for them to to show us and to tell us so um for, you know, in folks who maybe don't have the ability to videotape or audio tape or do a nice presentation, we're gonna help support that so that they can really um report out on their own experiences.

You know, Melissa, I think it's really important that we kind of make that a um obligation of all of the artists that have received that they need to tell their story in some kind of form that we can have it as a record so that we can show what the impact has been in those variety of different areas.

But I would I would really suggest that we uh uh make this um something that we really capture, but we also um uh have it recorded and involved so we can go back to it because if there are other organizations that want to begin to kind of support this kind of thing of supporting our artists, we need to have some record that it did make a difference in some ways.

So I would suggest that.

Thank you.

Um I had a question you had um mentioned about your um fellowship ambassadors or community ambassadors.

Community ambassadors.

That is also part of this.

It's actually part of it's part of what the city provides.

So there they work out of the um community engagement office, which is you know, we're back and forth with community engagement people because they're so on the ground in terms of being in community every week doing something.

Um, but this is a specific program where folks like you can apply to be a community ambassador to really represent the communities you serve or that you're part and active in with the city.

So if the city is trying to get out messages, they work with community ambassadors to get messages out, but they also take in information from communities through their ambassadors.

So we just went and did a simple presentation like what I did for you today when the grant was beginning, answered tons of questions, and they just jumped on it.

They were folks who are really interested in saying, hey, people in my community need to know about this, but they may have some language barriers that we can help support.

So I um like I say, I can't say enough about how how wonderful they were in supporting what we do.

Nice.

That was going to be my next question.

So commissioners can also be a part of that as well, or commissioners cannot apply to be a part of I don't know in terms of whether there is any kind of conflict.

I absolutely don't know that, but I know there's an application process that probably just closed for this next upcoming group of ambassadors.

I actually looked at it extended to the 9th of November.

Yeah, I mean, I think it's it's great for you all to know about because these are the people who are also out in community like you are.

Thank you.

Jeff.

Hi.

Um terrific work, by the way.

Um I wanted to know as the programs kind of coming to a close, um, if there's, and I and correct me if I'm wrong.

I I but I didn't I didn't know if you're also collecting data on just the process itself and um getting feedback from artists in terms of what worked well with the application process, what were the services that were most used, and what they think would improve the process so other artists can have success.

Yeah, I mean, I think those are really all good questions, and I think those are areas that we really do want to collect information on how was the application process for you, collecting information about the outreach.

Because I spent a lot of time talking about the outreach strategies, but if we find out that I mean it'll be just interesting once we start collecting the final first batch of information.

Um, how did you find out about this opportunity?

Where did you go?

Um, how were you engaged?

Was it easy to do?

We always, you know, that's always a um kind of a balance you're trying to create, getting the information you need so that people can make decisions, but making the application quick and easy to do.

We kept saying, can we create an application that if you did all your prep in advance, came up with your answers, thought about it within 30 minutes, start to finish, you can complete the application, and that's what we were trying to get to.

Something that anybody could do on your phone if you wanted to, easy to upload materials, things like that.

Um, so yeah, I mean, I think it's just constantly measuring the experience.

So I appreciate your saying that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next uh presentation is item number five on our calendar, phase two review design and license agreement.

Um I believe we have a presenter for this one.

Donald Gensler.

Afternoon, Chair Lavulo, afternoon commissioners.

Thanks very much for having me.

Um I am the Art and Public Places Manager for the uh Art and Public Places program, and as uh the chair had mentioned, my name's Donald Gensler.

I'm I'm joined today by two applicants for what was really our pilot program for uh temporary public art on city buildings or facilities.

Um before I start the presentation, I want to talk about just the process and how we got here.

About eight years ago, uh, when I had started with the city, there were a number of requests for projects on city buildings, but there didn't seem to be any kind of formal process in place.

Um but we quickly figured out we needed some kind of process to you know accurately review these requests and determine if it was even feasible and then how we would proceed.

So we created uh application process.

Um that seemed to work for some projects, but again, there wasn't a real citywide policy, so we we felt like some of the departments didn't understand, or the council offices, or even we internally didn't understand which project would go through which process.

So we started to develop, and it was it took some, it did take some time, and citywide policies do take some time.

But we finally finished a citywide policy for temporary public art.

And it was published in March of this year.

We are still working on potentially there's there's likely going to be some fees associated with this in the future, so we're we're working on that aspect before we have an information session.

But that will be forthcoming, and you all will be uh we'll do a presentation on that when we're ready to share that.

But what I wanted to share for you today is that along the way, we felt like we needed a moratorium on these type of projects until we could really figure out our process.

And after about a year-long moratorium, we had received a couple, actually, we'd received three or four uh applications, two of which the applicants are here with me today.

The other two decided they did not wish to proceed further with their applications.

And so at that time, uh, the one applicant, Wide Open Walls, who is on our agenda today to be discussed first, and the second applicant, Richard Alcala, for a project in Southside Park is going to be second on the agenda, both agreed with me in some conversation that hey, would you like to be our pilot projects?

We then took them through the application process, which is a two-phase process.

Uh, and by the way, we did share this process with the commission at that time, and we um we considered this community initiated public art to be distinguished from city initiated temporary public art, uh which is something separate and that might come from a city department.

But these were community-initiated temporary public art to be on a city facility, and they're each on, they're each being proposed on two different city facilities.

Uh, and I just have to really thank both of the applicants who are here today for going through this.

It has been a three-year-long process since they went through phase one.

Uh, so they we presented their projects, and you all as a commission body uh recommended approval to go to phase two.

Uh phase one was for location and artists, and we presented those.

And some things did change in both projects a bit.

Uh but uh but phase two is then for final design and the license agreement, which you do have in your packet materials, and today I'm gonna present both of those projects.

As I present each one, I'll call up at the end, I'll call up the applicant, so uh the applicants can say a few words, and then we'll take some comments from the public, and then we'd all like you to discuss uh whether you would recommend approval of this project proceeding.

All right, so I just wanted to kind of clarify you for you what we're doing here today and uh the process because it's not intuitive, and I and I will say it has taken quite some time, and we've learned a lot through working with both of these pilot programs.

All right, so I'll proceed.

So the first one uh is a proposal through wide open walls, a nonprofit organization at the Elmhurst Water Tower, which is the project site.

It is also referred to sometimes as the UC Davis Water Reservoir, and it is owned by the city of Sacramento, but it's on the kind of medical UC Davis Medical Campus site.

This is actually a copy of the final design.

We'll talk about that more uh in a little bit, uh, but I'm gonna briefly show you this a couple lines from this temporary public art policy, and then a little bit of our public art survey results.

One of the things that we realized was that we were asking the applicant to go through a fairly rigorous community engagement process, and both of them did.

Um, but then we thought, and and through some conversations with our commissioner at that time, should we also send out a survey as the program?

And uh, and I think it was a good suggestion and one that we followed up on.

So you'll get to see a little bit of those results.

So, first of all, like I had mentioned, the temporary public art program can be proposed by individuals, community groups, arts organizations.

They're just not coming from within the city, and they're not utilizing city funds.

We also don't have funding for these types of projects.

So if we were to have funding for a temporary project, which we certainly could, it will come out of our office.

But this is something where somebody has come to us and said, We've got this great project we'd like to do on a city building.

How do we do that?

And they would be paying for it.

So you can look up the full policy document on our webpage.

Sorry, there's a bit of a long thing, but if you just go to the Office of Arts and Culture website and you go to public art, you'll find the policy there.

But as part of the policy, they have to gather community input and present the design, and that's what Wide Open Walls has done in this particular community, mainly the Elmhurst community in what's known as Council District Six.

One other thing I'll mention is the initial artist.

There were three artists through some further conversation.

They ended up just working with one artist who proposed this design, and you have to imagine this design is going to go all the way around the building.

From the around the water reservoir.

From the results, and as part of the application process, you can see the community uh input of where the main demographic was, so the main groups that responded to this were from that particular council district.

Also, they left some different comments.

So there was also a little bit of a misunderstanding of what the design process was.

So some of the negative comments, let's say, uh expressed the dissatisfaction that we were even having a survey.

Um, and um, and then some other comments commented on you know the design, maybe from a purely subjective view, or what they thought their opinion was about the particular design.

Obviously, you can see here the overwhelming support for the design in this location.

Uh, and then we did receive probably mostly comments in favor of this particular design.

Uh, and so you got we got comments like uh it's beautiful and uplifting, the project transforms a beautiful bleak concrete eyesore.

Uh, number of those residents, we also met with those residents a number of times through the Elmhurst Community Neighborhood Association, uh, and they were very helpful also in that process.

You also have in your packet materials, the actual application that was submitted and has a whole series of letters both from council members and from uh uh neighborhood association groups that were in support and as well as some individual artists and people.

And so in the end, this was the final design.

Uh, you also have uh an image of it, how it might be look on the water tower itself.

Um, but the design was meant is meant to kind of show you this Sacramento in a 360, so you have to imagine that it will go around and wrap around.

One last thing I'll say before I'll bring up uh David Sobon, uh the executive director of wide open walls, is that when we talked with the artist, the artist is not from Sacramento but does do projects here in the area and is really exciting, has a group of local artists that he has worked with at different times and is excited to kind of form a team to uh work on this quite substantial project uh for uh this particular site.

So before I move on to the next project, I'd like to bring up uh David Sobon.

David, would you like to say a few words about um uh about uh your proposed project?

Well, hello, and thank you, Donald.

Great job.

Um, yes, three years.

Three years to get this design through and three years to get through this process.

But at this point, um we're pretty excited.

Donald mentioned a little bit about the design.

If you can see those two ends of that design, you can kind of imagine that that they would actually blend together.

Um, so you could literally walk around the entire uh the entire building.

This is a major project.

This mural is a hundred feet tall and five hundred feet long, which would place it as one of the largest murals on the West Coast.

It would be the largest mural by one single artist.

Ian Wilkins is the artist that we ended up going with.

He has painted no less than a half a dozen projects in Sacramento and has worked with many local artists.

There will probably be, I would imagine, at least six local artists working with him on this design, and quite a few pieces of major equipment as you can imagine to go up a hundred feet tall.

The area has already been prepped, and the city spent uh, I guess it doesn't matter what the city spent, um, the maintenance um on that uh water reservoir was already done.

So they were very interested in in basically prepping that area first with their own uh their own methods, uh the concrete needed repair.

At one point we were just gonna prime it um and paint the design over that.

They thought this the repair that needed to be done sometime in the next uh five to ten years would be best to do it before the mural happened.

So that was a little bit that added another few months to the actual delay of getting done.

But the prime the prime work has been done, all the sealing has been done.

There was an awful lot of uh stuff that was on that water tower, old cellular um stuff, hooks and things like that that needed to come down and a lot of tree trimming around there to make it very visible when the um when the art actually gets started.

So again, three years long progress, thanks to the city and our and our hopefully we'll have a new way to do this.

It'll be a little bit easier in the future for everybody else, but I'm glad we're at this final stage.

So, Stephen.

Dave, I wanted to um understand how will we maintain this over the life, you know, the years.

What what's what's kind of be what's your thoughts around that?

How will the well um I think it's part of part of what you'll see in that agreement is the longevity of a project like this.

Um the the extra work that was put into the base of that um and the materials that'll be used, it will last a long time.

Um in order to be able to repaint it or touch it up, it's something that's not really possible.

Um again, these projects have a shelf life, and we have we will meet the agreements that the cities put forth as far as how long it will be maintained.

More than likely, just like if you take a look at the uh the piece of artwork that's on 18th NL, the Johnny Cash, you can notice over seven years now that it's been up there that it started to fade a little bit, but it's still a brilliant piece of artwork.

So just like most outdoor murals, even when they're coated, even when there's a coating that's put on top of them, um they will eventually fade a little bit.

The materials that we're using on this um will be a little bit different.

The area where the sunflowers are will probably be where the most brilliant colors are, and that'll be an area that'll be in the shadiest spot when you walk around the uh when you walk around the tower.

So that had something to do with basically the the uh the the brilliance of those colors.

Those yellows would be the first that would actually show any side of fading, but it'll be up there for 25 years, I'm sure.

As long as the water tower will be there, it'll be up there.

Thank you.

Are there any um thank you?

Can we go to public comments before we move to um our commissioner comments, please?

Thank you, David.

I appreciate it.

Um, so yeah, I I think that that's fine.

Uh you can do public comments, and then you guys have comments for me as well.

I think that would be great.

I would love to hear your your feedback as well.

All right, thank you, Charlie.

Thank you, Chair.

We do have one speaker for this item, Lambert.

This this topic right here, uh, this is definitely not going to be a love piece.

What I'm getting ready to say to you.

Uh I would suggest that the city attorney make sure he pays attention in the entire rostrum.

I was here April 14th, and I put on the record, and I'm not in the art community, I'm in the cheesecake business, and I mentioned that I had uh read about a uh contract that was given to wide open walls, and it was without a written agreement, and what that led to was a you couldn't audit where the money went.

And I as a business owner, I said, Well, wait a minute.

If somebody can get a written agreement, I mean, get funding from City Hall without a written agreement, and it can't be audited.

I went in front of the mayor and the city council and the city attorney and also the city manager, and I said and I meant what I said.

I said, can I get in that same line where I can get a no-written agreement for cheesecakes where you can't monitor what I did with the money, or is that just for whites only?

And I meant that because when you're in business, if you give me $300,000, I will give you back a hundred thousand slices of cheesecake.

Where are you gonna buy a cheesecake for three dollars a slice delivered?

This is a terrible precedent, and I can tell a lot of you haven't read the current report today.

Because if you did, you should delay this until you read that report.

Because when you just asked him, how long would it last?

If you looked in a report, it says that it's good for 20 years.

That's two 10-year terms for wide open walls.

Thank you for your comments, Chair.

There are no other speakers for this item.

Thank you.

Commissioners, I know that there are speakers that who would like to ask questions in Karuka.

Thank you, Chair, and thank you for your presentation.

Um, I know you said there are local artists.

How many are from the actual community where the tower is located?

Um, I don't the only artist that we're discussing is the designer of the mural, Ian the painter.

Yes, and he was reviewed by the commission uh previously.

So I think what I had mentioned to you all was that at his presentation, he informed everybody that he had a group of local artists that he likely would be hiring to be able to complete the mural.

But we I don't know specifics of what artists are going to be working on that particular project.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Um, had some questions too.

Yeah.

I don't know white open walls only from the president from the people that came in to talk about wide open walls.

And I know that you said that the funds for this will not be taken from city funds and that they would be coming out of their own pockets to fund this, correct?

That's correct, yes.

And you have their budget.

Yeah.

What is the benefit that they're getting out of funding a big mural like that?

And that it's being brought to us at the commission here in the city hall.

Why are we going to vote on this yay or nay?

You're not voting yay or nay.

You're voting whether you are going to recommend approval that the project proceeds.

So, just to be clear.

Um, so um we're we're trying to create a public process.

This is meant to very much be a public process, so that each step of the way before before the city makes a decision on whether somebody could do a project on a city facility, we have opened that up for discussion and and taking questions just like we are today.

But we've also gone through a fairly rigorous process in terms of the community engagement work that was done, the conversations that were done leading up to this point.

So, uh, Commissioner Labulow, that's exactly why we're here with this, um, and that moving forward, other city of what we consider community initiated temporary public art projects will go through the same two-phase process of which this is the second phase.

Yeah, um, and so we're just trying to be open and transparent about the process and make sure that everybody understands uh what um you know what the city is is uh is supporting because ultimately we're bringing the project forward.

We feel we feel it's um we feel it's feasible and it has support from the department, department of utilities, and from the local community.

So we're sharing that with you as objective observers, making sure that you guys have all that information so you can think about it and and then and then let us know whether you would recommend approval for the project to proceed.

Yeah, so it's because it's on city property.

City property, yeah.

Otherwise, if it's on private property, you don't need a permit or permission from the city to paint a mural on private property.

Yeah.

And actually, we're working on some mural guidelines that we've got a very rough version of uh that's gonna be up very soon.

Uh, but uh, but yeah, there's no permit process.

The only reason is because it's on a city-owned property.

Okay.

My next question is um of the data that you guys collected, yeah.

Um, was it only specifically for those um community members that surround that mural?

It wasn't.

How far out did that reach go?

Yeah, it wasn't only for community members that surrounded that mural, but we generally have worked a lot of these projects.

Um are, you know, if you have to get up every morning and look at the look at the project, we feel that you should be able to comment on that.

Yeah, we didn't feel like going citywide uh when people wouldn't necessarily know that particular area.

Um we found that when they're community initiated projects, if the community is in support, these that that survey could go out to people in other demographics and other uh areas of the city, and it did.

Uh, but uh we we focus mainly on the neighborhood association group and the council office to help us determine kind of who's the main group right around that mural.

Thank you.

Almost like a radius.

Yeah, that answers my question why it's a beautiful mural.

Um, but we still have to know, right?

Because I don't know if you were in here that day, the two meetings that we were here, and this was full.

It was very, very full of people who spoke about white open walls, and that's the only reason why I know about white open walls, and so it has to be representative of the people.

I get it because it's a neighborhood, it's a neighborhood mural, but you're gonna get more than the neighborhood that's that will pass that by, and that will also ask the same questions.

So, in us just doing due diligence, I'd like to know.

Absolutely, and I'll just follow up that one of the big kind of neighbors there also is UC Davis, and um they have been a great supporter of having this product this mural on their campus.

They like the idea that people would see something on that water tower when they're uh at their hospital as well.

So it that they were a big supporter and continue to be a big supporter of that.

Um and I guess lastly, I'd just like to say uh, well, yeah, I agree with you.

There were some comments, and you know, I'm I'm not here to to pass any judgment on one person's comment at another.

But I am here to say that as a city we need to remain objective and transparent and open, and that's what I'm always gonna do.

And I'm gonna take every person through the same application process as any other person, and I think we deserve everybody deserves that level of respect.

And so that's what I continue to do, and I'll I'll continue to do that for any projects that are presented to the city of Sacramento.

Thank you.

Yep.

Next speaker, I know.

Thank you, Chair.

Uh just a couple of quick questions, Donald.

Sure.

Um, so I just want to clarify when the um when someone reaches out with a proposed project, to what extent do you work with them to help them understand the values that are sort of informed the way that the arts commission would like us to go about um selecting and funding projects?

To me, that would mean like supporting or giving primacy to local artists, making sure that they are fairly compensated.

It sounds like we've done a pretty good job of um assessing them, involving the local community and the impact of the local community.

But those first two, like, are those also part of your outreach in that conversation with whoever's bringing you the project?

Yeah, probably not.

We're not funding it at all.

So uh I'm just to be really up front with you.

Uh we are not commenting on how somebody else is choosing to use their funds.

Um, and perhaps that's something that, you know, we have our own uh uh statement on equity and on transparency, and that is the way that we operate as a program and we operate as an office and as a city.

Um but uh we it is it would be difficult for me to determine what someone's uh experience is in terms of um the values that they have.

Um and as far as I'm concerned, uh we review an application and we take that person's application seriously and we give opportunity for public comment.

Uh and I'm I'm sure in most situations there's people that find that an organization is valued or does have values that they agree with and also find that they may have values that they don't agree with.

Um so I I just don't think that I can I can comment, I can take you through the process and bring it to this commission, uh and allow this commission to uh uh recommend approval.

Um other than that, I'm I'm there's there's really no other review process besides the one that we've outlined in our city wide policy.

And um I guess I would like to know how come the citywide policy isn't informed by the statement that the commission adopted.

Well, it is informed by the statement.

It's not to say that we are not informed by our equity statement, and we are, and we certainly uh share that with everybody that we work with, but I don't have a a rubric to determine whether someone follows your values or someone else's values.

I want to clarify that's not what I'm suggesting.

Because you did say whether they're well I'm asking to what extent are we informing the applicant, like which in this case I think is the neighborhood association.

Uh no, the applicant is wide open walls.

Got it.

So whoever's uh in my understanding they are they them, the council office sort of are funding the project.

The council office is not funding the project.

Okay.

It is coming entirely from the applicant.

Okay.

As will the project that you are about to see afterwards uh in Southside Park, entirely funded by the applicant.

The council office is not funding it, or and if the city is giving some funds to it, I will just say it's not from our office because we don't have funds associated with that.

Yes.

Yeah.

I I I guess I just want to reiterate that I think these are values that the city should support in in its entirety, um, and that this is a city-owned property, yeah, and that they should be reflective of that.

And I in some way, shape, or form, we should find a way to uh impart that to applicants and to the community, so that that is informing their conversations and their processes, and that it's clear to the rest of the community that that's the case.

I'm not trying to do this to shut something down.

I'm trying to do this to show that people are doing their due diligence and that they're taking other people the the community's perspectives into account.

So thank you for reframing that for a second.

So when I heard you at first, I heard you say, does this organiz you know, did you did you do they follow the exact values of the city?

I I can't make that determination, but we absolutely share our equity statement, we share all of that information with anybody who works with us.

That is part of our website, that is part of our public process.

Um, and if we as an office could do more, then I'm I'm happy to hear how we might be able to do more.

But as a staff member, I can't make a value judgment on uh whether somebody is following one value or another.

Um and all that we can do I think is is is share with them that these these are the values, and and that would go for any project uh that might be before this body.

Um and uh and I think we do uh if you look at our website.

I think these things are public facing and are something that that really say who we are as uh as an agency within city government uh and um what we support.

So um and and so uh as far as I'm concerned, we have continued to work in that way, but I don't have any kind of test or rubric for whether somebody, you know, is following one value uh list or another.

Okay.

Um my only other question is you said that this got this took a long time, took like three years to put together.

Yeah, well um, and I will and I I see you maybe have a follow-up to that, but I'll just say part of their reason was or a couple things.

One, it was also the department of utilities.

Uh what we have found is that as we start to involve our other city departments, they have they have issues that come up, and they said, you know what, we have deferred maintenance on this.

So you probably we probably wouldn't want something like that to start until we finish this, but this is something that we needed to do anyway.

So let's go ahead and do it.

Um plus in developing the policy, the citywide policy, um, we were learning from both of the pilot programs from this wide open wall application and from Richard Ocala's application, and and taking them through those steps.

So when I when I say that I thank them, it is because they did follow through steps that were outlined but weren't outlined in a written document.

Um, and there was a bit of trust there going back and forth when I said, hey, now we're going to have a survey that wasn't clearly outlined because we hadn't had that survey component.

Moving forward, I think we would have a much more clear path of how an applicant would proceed further.

And I don't think it would take three years, but I do think it would take at least one year just to go through everything.

But thank you, uh Commissioner Wallace.

I think excellent questions, and I appreciate it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Can we get Jeff?

Sorry.

Go ahead, Jeff.

Hey Donald.

Uh I was looking over the um the video from the archived uh commission meeting back in 2023 when you were in phase one about this, and you had mentioned I had noticed you had mentioned that uh the license was revocable at the city's discretion.

At any time at any time, so like kind of following up on on Commissioner Wallace's um comments.

Um given that like there's no necessary policy for determining whether someone's values are um aligned with uh what we have at the city and at the office.

Um what what kind of development on the policy for what would be you know a grounds for revoking a license, for example.

Um has that been developed?

Um I'm gonna take a step back here for a second and just say that in our world right now, we were we are in a very politically charged and um what I see as a difficult time, and the Office of Arts and Culture, or at least the art in public places program, is not sufficiently prepared to decide whether one organization fits someone's value.

I understand, I understand I can't sit here in good conscience and and tell you that we would be actively taking steps to determine what someone's values are.

I understand that.

No, no, no, hold on.

Commissioner Eisenberg, you better hear me for a second.

I was asking about the licensing specifically, you mentioned that it was vocal.

But that's very concerning to me.

I'm not just trying to judge someone's values as part of an public art process.

Donald, what in my question gave you the impression that I was suggesting that at all?

You asked me, you said that person's values changed, then could the license before.

I said I said just following up on that.

What I said, what development on if you're I understand what you're saying, and in many ways I agree with you.

We we are not butting edge, but in the last commission meeting, there's this concept of if the city finds something that they're unhappy with or something going on.

They can revoke the license.

And I'm wondering, well, what what are the exact yeah?

What is the something for revoking the license?

Like what was there a reason?

And is there a policy for that?

Is it is it laid out?

I'm just asking that.

Okay.

Well, you asked it in the context of values, and so in the context, but I understand what well what Commissioner Wallace is mentioning too is we have these public spaces that we want to reflect our best selves, and we want that in alignment with what we've developed here.

Um I understand we don't have we don't we can't.

Sorry, I don't mean to cut you off, but I understand nobody's saying like we have to we have to play, you know, um mind cop here and understand what what the inner workings of someone's mind is, but I'm just wondering what what are the actual developed steps for determining if somebody's somebody's doing something that we have.

I don't think there are I don't think there are any steps.

I'll just explain to you that any licenses or uh uh agreement is revocable by either party.

That is an instrument of law.

It's it doesn't have to do with a policy consideration.

The city could make a determination if it felt that that piece needed to be removed for one reason or another.

I can't begin to contemplate, and I'm s and and what my response to you was, Commissioner, and I'm sorry if I if I came off in any way um in in being argumentative, I didn't mean to be.

I might be a little bit passionate about this because I'm personally I I feel that the polarization of our of our of our nation is difficult for me right now, but that that's personal, and I probably that's my error.

But I I feel like right now, like judging someone's values is not appropriate, but uh as far as the license agreement goes, the city might, for any number of reasons, one of which might be that it's determined that the piece, you know, uh gets in the way with oper operations, or that maybe there is some huge um issue around the piece, and that the city decides that piece needs to be removed.

The city has the right to remove that.

And when I explained that at the commission meeting, I was literally really explaining so that you all would understand at a term of art that a license agreement is fully revocable by either party.

Whereas a contract would be legally binding, right?

And so it's a little bit different from a contract, and I thought it's important to share that um with you all.

And so that's why I that's why I shared that.

Well, thank you for the clarification on that.

Yeah, absolutely.

Thank you, Dr.

Winlock.

No, as we're talking about this from the issue of the process of approving for them.

You know, I I keep coming back to the thought if we're sharing with them our values and as a city and the things that are a part of it.

Yeah, I think in the process for them to react to that in a sense about they support it or they're you know, we we make sure within our area that uh we make sure that we're being uh following some of the things that are part of it, in some ways getting a formal statement from those that are run around the values of the city, you know, we worked really hard on this, making sure that the equity and the diversity was a part of the city, yeah.

And and so because this is a city project, um my thinking is that any organization that comes in and does the city has to understand that these are our values.

Now they don't have to have the same values, but they do have to react to the issue about, you know, I accept these, or I I hear those are the things that are part of the city.

So somehow, you know, we need to think about how we have them react to what we believe.

Absolutely.

I appreciate that.

I um uh I think earlier uh I was understanding that as that our office would be making some kind of subjective or some kind of uh choice there.

But I I appreciate that in that we could very well say that the applicant needs to make a statement uh and include that statement with their application based on the you know diversity equity inclusion statement and the values of the Office of Arts and Culture and the Arts Commission.

So yeah, I think that that's great, and I'm uh I absolutely could um could you know could add that.

Um I'm very happy to add that to the application process.

And in fact, we've learned a lot.

I mean, there was there were a lot of steps.

You may remember, Commissioner Winlock, we we had a much different process, it was maybe a one-time process previously.

Um, and so we have tried to make this a more deliberate and uh process where the applicant includes letters of support, engagement, and all that.

So yeah, I do think a statement would be good.

We do have the applicant as well, and you all are welcome to ask more questions of the applicant as you will be able to ask questions of the other applicant as well.

So that was our thinking.

So we would have the applicant here if there were any questions that they could answer directly.

But I like the idea that they would include a statement that says that they uh or reflects on the values that we've shared with them.

Yeah, reflection, not so much of a determining that they have the same model.

Yeah, that's just made me feel uncomfortable.

I can't make that kind of determination.

I think that what we're asking for is that they need to know that these are areas that are we want to make sure, and they need to reflect on that from their point of view, in the sense.

Okay, yeah.

Thank you.

Thank you, everyone.

I just want to remind all of our commissioners what um we are going to be passing a motion on this.

We are not passing a motion on giving them any funds.

That's not what they're asking for.

It's just because it's on city property, and do we think that it should move forward to phase two.

This is yeah, this would be the final phase for the commission.

And at this point, we would continue to have to work things out with Department of Utilities that is in support, but we still need to have a license agreement assigned and the Department of Utilities.

I have a memorandum of understanding with the Department of Utilities that also has to be fully executed.

We came to you all first to get you all to comment on it, and then we would move forward to that final step.

And then, of course, there's the planning of it actually when it would take place within this next year.

Um, so from now, well, you know, from when you guys vote, it would we give the applicant at least one year to begin the project project.

Right.

So feel free to vote however you want to vote.

Um, Maya, go ahead.

I'm gonna move that we approve the um license agreement.

Thank you.

I second that.

Can we get a uh a verbal vote?

All those in favor, please say aye.

Any opposed?

Any abstain.

The motion passes with the opposition from no commissioners and abstention from no commissioners.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next item.

Thank you.

Oh, thank you.

Thank you.

Our next item is phase two review design and license agreement temporary public art um application pilot program with Donald again.

Yes.

So again, uh just as a quick reminder, and I'm also uh I'm gonna watch myself on time here to make sure you guys can end appropriately.

Um, this is the second project uh that um that we had brought forward as a pilot project uh and has also been in the works for um three years, if not longer at this stage.

Uh and this is was brought to us by Richard Alcala, who is the applicant, and it is for a mural project on the back side of the South Side Park amphitheater.

Uh so um you have the his full application.

Um Richard has um gotten a number of letters of support, which are included in the application.

He also has a video of support, which I think I gave you the video link from uh astronaut uh and uh a number of other folks uh associated with the mural.

Um and uh I'll just share with you real quick.

Uh the mural is uh the title is the Sacramento Indigenous and Latino Heritage Mural.

And again, it would be on the back side.

Uh and you all do have that application material on the back side of the South Side Park Amphitheater.

Uh, and it highlights uh various uh uh figures within the uh indigenous community and the Latino community, mostly here in Sacramento, but also through California.

Uh just to share with you again that this is part, and that does actually show you an image of it kind of superimposed.

It is on the back of the amphitheater.

Again, I want to reiterate that is currently has a mural on the front of the amphitheater by the Royal Chicano Air Force.

And we're actually in conversations with the Royal Chicano Air Force about doing some restoration work and programming work around that mural in the front.

But we are here today to discuss the back mural.

Richard has brought this here as the applicant is fully funding this, has done a number of funding programs and fundraisers to be able to raise these funds.

I think in some context, he he has received some money from some city council offices.

So while we as an art in public places program are not specifically funding, I do think that uh Mr.

Alcala has received some funding from the city in this particular instance.

Uh and uh as I had kind of spoken about before, he has also included a great amount of community engagement.

I was present at a number of those meetings, mainly with the Southside Park Neighborhood Association to make sure uh that the full design was being presented and that everybody at that meeting understood what the proposal was.

So just as with the previous applicant, we did a survey through the neighborhood association.

This was the kind of result from the different zip codes of where that survey came from, uh, who who answered the survey.

Uh this was the um kind of final results of the survey, uh, which you can see overwhelmingly were uh positive.

Um, but there were some you know questions along the way about whether there should be a mural on the back side of this existing historic structure, and we did have, and and also there were some questions along the way about what imagery would be on uh a mural that was essentially a memorial mural of a number of different important uh figures here in Sacramento and throughout California.

Uh as you can see here, overwhelmingly favorable to the design, and we did work with Richard uh quite extensively to make sure that because he has a number of artists that are working on the project that we could assemble the design together.

And I will say he was really very gracious in saying, I understand I'm gonna work and I'm gonna get that done.

And he did uh present his full design to um to the neighborhood association.

Uh these are some of the comments, very beautiful and very thoughtful.

Uh, another comment the community deserves representation.

Um, so uh I think these uh comments and what I witnessed, what I kind of objectively witnessed each time that I went to a meeting, was that uh everybody seemed in favor of the project proceeding, and so just again that is a kind of uh idea of what the design would look like, and this uh bishop in the front, by the way, just so you know what this religious figure is.

Sometimes there's been some questions around that.

Uh, this is Bishop Gallegos, he's also known as a low rider bishop here in Sacramento.

Uh and uh he was an active pastor uh across the street at Our Lady of Guadalupe.

And they did also submit one of the letters of support for this project.

So he is there with a figure of uh Our Lady of Guadalupe, which also reflects the community and the culture around uh that area and the church.

And then these are some of the side panels.

So there are a number of artists.

I'm gonna let Richard come up.

He could tell you the exact number.

I want to say we're about 10 or 11, but he probably knows much better than I do.

And uh yeah, and why don't I why don't I bring Richard up to say a few words because he speaks much better about it than I do?

Richard, thank you.

Yes.

All right.

Where do you want me to start?

I had hair when this started.

So this is a passion project from us and everybody involved, a lot of them are here.

Um, let's say.

Let me start here.

So three years ago, we had this idea because I was doing the I don't know if you're familiar with Bishop Bagos at all.

But he's up for sainthood right now.

He's buried in entombed right there at the Guadalupe and Shrine across the street from South Side Park.

And I I wrote a play about him called Burnt Ortiz about his life story.

So when we come out of church and all you see was this blank wall with graffiti and just ugliness, and we thought, you know, we're gonna put something on there and make it beautiful, like the front side, honoring the Roachcano Air Force and continuing the legacy of South Side Park and everybody involved.

And um, so I thought, well, let's let's honor the neighborhood.

Let's honor Sacramento and let's honor our culture, especially right now with with Trump and his and his hate against all of us trying to erase us.

Um this is more uh meaningful to me now.

You know, the first three panels are dedicated to the indigenous tribes of the area, Miwok, Maidu, and the Nissanan tribes who are actually doing their own panel.

Um Shelley Covert up in Nevada City is down here.

She has one of her artists who are doing that panel, and then as we turn the corner, we're honoring Senora Cobb, Lazaro, Florencio, and Chewy, the Aztec dancers and the folklorico dancers that Senora Cobb, who's 93 now introduced to Sacramento area.

Um the next panel is 1966 March from Delano, Cesar Chavez, Dolores Huerta, and we actually have go ahead, and um anyway, it's the history is what's important.

And the next panel would be the Latinos politicians, the center panel is Bishop Gagos and the Virgin and the Low Riders cruising on the bottom.

The Sacramento County, you can see the map that will be loaded with the that's the icon panel.

It'll be loaded with with icons like Campbell Soup, the Alhambra theater, and logos of all icons, tower records, so on and so on.

Okay.

So that'll be full of little logos.

The next panel is is um the astronaut Jose Hernandez who sent us a video and thanking us.

The next panel is all the local yokels from the Latino cultures, been here forever, then we're just acknowledging them.

Okay, so you have educators, theater, music, and some journalists and and educators, politicians.

The next panel is is the on Fruit Ridge, the sports um center, Mexican American Sports Center, and then you turn the corner, there I don't see it.

Can you flip it?

Oh yeah, uh, actually it's up there.

Yeah, I'll do the big button.

I'll let you play with your toy.

So, so as we turn the corner, there's El Soldado, who was also originally from South Side Park at the Mexican Center back in World War II, the Madres, the Society of Mothers raised money $4,000 by selling Tamales to have this statue made in Italy.

It's it's and it's now on 10th Street on Capitol Grounds, and it's the first and and only statue dedicated to Mexican-American soldiers.

So it's very important, and it's still from South Side Park to that.

That's also important.

The next panel is showing the elders handing off the future to the youth, is what that symbolizes, and then the last panel will be the Aztec wings to where people can be interactive and stand in front of it and take pictures, which is inclusive to everybody in the neighborhood.

And hopefully it becomes a uh destination for tourists and people to come, you know.

So, and there's all the artists are local, they're all Latino and indigenous, but they are local, and that's their talent what you're looking at.

And we're dying to start.

Uh thank you.

Clerk.

Are there any uh public comments?

Thank you, Chair.

Yes, we do have two speakers for this item.

Our first speaker will be George.

Just in case you have any questions.

Members of the commission, George Raya, fourth congressional city council district.

What Richard hasn't mentioned, he is funding this himself.

Forty thousand dollars.

His own money.

He's not asking money from the city.

He is funding it.

And I'm helping to raise the rest of it because the city says you need more money for insurance.

So we have the um Indian tribe in Yellow County, the Ya Yokah Gehe Winno Tribe.

Anyway, because of uh the three panels that are Native American.

We have a friend over there.

Uh some of you may remember Alejandro Cabrera, who used to work for council member um Gera.

He's now the government affairs person over there.

He's a vet.

The fiscal agent for this is the allied vets council.

Um so we'll be raising another 10 to 20,000 to cover the insurance.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comment.

Our next speaker will be Lambert.

You may have a question of why would I come down here and speak on this?

Well, when I was uh attending grand high school, uh we had a teacher, his name we loved him, his name was Mr.

Gutierrez.

He actually taught back then you had to graduate, you couldn't graduate from high school unless you took a second language.

So I took Spanish.

We could have taken French, but it was so many people at our campus that were either Chicano or Latino or Hispanic, so I took Spanish so I could relate to them.

Now I've heard uh someone mentioned Mrs.

Dolores Huerta.

I can mention her myself.

I met her, and she was she's a wonderful person, she's still alive and well, actually.

And when I was talking to her, she told me, which surprised me, she told me that the Black Panthers were very influential to their movement.

I didn't realize that till she told me, and I believe her over anybody that would tell me something in a book, because she was right there with her husband in the trenches, and they give a lot of credit to people that shouldn't get it.

Now, as I listened earlier, I was hearing about values.

Uh whenever I've submitted any paperwork, I never saw the word value, and I never saw the words uh I have to like you.

I'm not here for that.

Some people uh are not outgoing and friendly, because where I come from, you you don't trust strangers.

I'm just submitting paperwork.

But if somebody is interpreting it that might try to blame Trump for diversity, equity, and inclusion problems.

Well, there's a resistance at City Hall to DIE, and some people down here are thrilled that Trump is here pushing that agenda.

Thank you for your comments.

Our next speaker is Christina.

Hi, good afternoon.

My name is Cristina Alvarez, and um I'm part of the women's committee with labor council for Latin American Advancement, AFL CIO, and um also a labor organizer here in the community.

Um good afternoon.

You know, this park is a very beautiful and I want to say cultural emblem of the city, all the marches we start from there at their actions, just everything this park represents is it's a lot.

So I'm here on behalf of um not just myself but my community, but also the folks and the faces that are going to be recognized on the mural, including Al Rojas, who um works specifically with the farm workers and organizing the farm workers who founded and founded what is now the UFW, original founders, and I just want to say I appreciate all the work that our uh Richard Alcala Desiree and our community have been working diligently so that local folks, especially leaders like Al Rojas are present on the mural, and um I'm here to support that.

So thank you.

Thank you for your comments.

Our next speaker is Desiree.

Uh first I want to say much.

Thank you for this moment before the commission, the arts commission.

Me llamo di Cere Rojas, soy la hija de Alberto Rojas y Alena Jamila Rojas.

I am the daughter of Albert M.

Rojas and Elena Jamila Rojas, co-founders of the United Farm Workers uh Union, uh the farm workers union.

It wasn't just a handful of people, but it was uh several, along with Larry Itilong and of course Chavez and Huerta and Gilbert Padilla.

And um our our life history and our work in this movement is supporting farm workers and those who are oppressed.

Farm workers of all walks of life.

First of all, in California, we were the family who took the great boycott in 1968 to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

We were on the boycott the longest.

Uh we were out there as a family earning five dollars a week, living off a donation, donated food, clothing, and housing that was paid for by the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh.

When we returned, we returned in many places in California on Huelgas, and one of the places we ended up was in Yolo County, and from there from the tomato strike, my father uh bought a home in Southside Park, lived there for over 45 years, paid property taxes, and from Southside Park since I was a little girl, 1974, I have been flying, uh passing out flyers on behalf of farm workers, immigration rights, and also indigenous people rights.

There's a famous quote that my father is known for, and he would say, No somos immigrantes, somos los originales de este tierra.

We are not immigrants, we are the original people of this continent and of this land.

And out of Southside Park, my father mentored thousands of people and organized thousands of rallies and marches on behalf of workers and also as a co-founder of SCIU Local One.

Yes, okay.

So I want to thank Richard Abdala, the spirit, thank you for your comments.

Our next speaker is Fatima.

Hi, thank you all for this time.

Thank you, Richard, for spearheading this project.

Um, my name is Fatima Garcia, I am the president of the labor council for Latin American Advancement, AFL CIO.

I was mentored by Al Rojas, and I think that during this time, what we are learning and what history has taught us is that we have to really acknowledge the people who have been on the ground and not selling out our people.

I think that when we talk about people who are highlighted in our history, a lot of times is fabricated by um uh boo by the um elite class and not representation of the working class.

And so um one of the things how we connected was because of this is our Rojas' community.

Um, Cesar Chavez is mentioned often, Dolores Huerta is mentioned often, but when we look at um our history and how anti immigrant um till recent years, Dolores Huerta has been.

I think it's critical for us to um uplift the local um founders of the UFW that we have in our city and honor that history that really tells the working class and the people's history.

Um so I do urge you guys to vote yes on this.

Um, I think that it really speaks volume, like Richard said, it's not our Rojas, uh just our Rojas, but it's also the woman, the mothers that you know um collected donations to honor their children in the military.

Um, and we know that people of color are often um not the ones that are telling the story, but it's always people that don't look like us that want to tell our stories, and so this is a representation of actual impacted people, people of color telling our story, and I think it's uh really great um path forward for Sacramento to uh support working class and people of colors telling their own narratives.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comment.

Our last speaker on this item is Ruben.

Hello, everybody.

How are you doing?

I have two minutes.

Uh, real quick, I want to thank uh City of Sacramento and Creative Economy for I got a grant for this this year, so I can answer every question that you guys asked today.

Um I am also on uh this mural, and this mural is a very beautiful mural, and it has, I would say vote yes on it.

Um it has everything that I think Sacramento represents in a different way, but also my panels weren't shown, Richard.

Um I'm the only artist here, but we'll talk about that later on.

Um, but it's a beautiful mural.

The collective artists are a very beautiful collective, and they're very um brilliant.

Uh Richard has done a lot of work.

I've been with him with this, you know, side by side and try to help him out on certain things, but he does have a heart of beauty and a heart of Sacramento.

So I um fully endorse uh this mural, not because I'm on it, because I would do that anyways.

Um, and um yeah, so I like I said I like to thank you in the city of Sacramento.

I like to thank Maya too because she's always has an uh ear from me when I have you know when I have questions in District 4.

So uh thank you, and yeah, vote for Richard.

Thank you for your comments, Chair.

There's no other speakers for this item.

Thank you.

We'll have our first comment from our youth commissioner.

Uh Commissioner Roscoe.

Hi there.

I just wanted to start off by saying thank you for this wonderful presentation.

Um, as a little girl going to Our Lady of Guadalupe, I think this is a wonderful project, and I'm excited to see it through.

I did have a question though, more about the technical maintenance of this mural.

Um, how consistently will this maintenance be attended to?

This comes considering from the fact that this is a more accessible area that is susceptible to damage via weather or other people.

I just wanted to know if that amount of consideration will be taken into effect.

Yeah, it's a great question.

Um, and as with the previous applicant, the maintenance responsibilities do fall upon the applicant because these are temporary public art projects on a city facility.

Uh the applicant is required to maintain uh the mural.

Um, and we will help notify the applicant when there's if there's any issue and if they wish to come back out and retouch or work on something, they would work through our office to be able to do that.

We also require that they put on an anti-graffiti and UV coding sealer on their mural, as will the previous applicant, as will this applicant.

So remains to be seen.

Uh time uh is uh the worst enemy with these murals, and uh you're absolutely right, they can fall into uh deterioration.

Uh in fact, on the other side, the RCAF mural, we are currently in conversation and we'll be having a whole series of more public meetings about a restoration that will take place on that uh particular project.

And while that project was previously not an art in public places program project, I'm actually thrilled to let everybody know that we're moving towards assessing that into our collection.

It was done literally the year before this program was created.

So uh small technicality, but uh it's something that we've been working towards and we're really excited about.

So maintenance is an ongoing thing, uh Roma, and uh we uh we're doing our best uh to keep up with it, and we'll do our best to work with uh the applicant as well.

Uh and and by the way, I should say I'm happy to answer questions.

You also I think I mentioned it before at the previous applicant.

You're welcome to address a question to the applicant.

That's that is why we brought them here.

So I'm happy to bring them up, but I do maintenance all day long, so I'm happy to answer your question too.

Thank you, and I'm excited for this representation to be seen.

Great.

Thank you, Dr.

Winlock.

I just want to say that um I live in the land park uh community for the last 32 years, and I also consider South Side as a part of our community, and I just want to say how beautiful um it is.

I'm I'm learning more every day about the contributions of our uh community members, and your mural is going to help me even more.

But I I just really want to acknowledge how we are a community.

South side is not separate, it's all part of our area, and being able to recognize those in that community, is just fabulous.

So I just want to give you a compliment.

The work is just beautiful.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Commissioner Wallace.

Thank you, Chair.

Um, this is just a I want to tie some things together.

Um, so I've been working on cultural policy with the city uh with the help of people like Donald for a long time now, and I'm really excited to see things like this come to fruition.

Um so I commend you for creating this process, and I commend Richard for um all of the uh I'm sure countless hours uh putting this together and for all the artists, and I appreciate the inclusiveness of it.

Um I feel like it fits uh nicely with the Low Vider Lane um approval that we just did at the planning commission last year, and I'm really excited to see Sacramento starting to tell a broader story about its um history and culture.

And with that, I would like to move that we approve this license agreement.

I will just sign and if we can get a um have a motion uh verbally.

All those in favor, please say aye.

Any opposed?

Any abstain?

The motion passes with opposition from no commissioners and abstention from no commissioners.

Thank you.

Thank you guys very much.

Thank you.

Wow.

Thank you.

The next item is manager's report.

Um Jason John, Cultural and Creative Economy Manager with the Office of Arts and Culture.

First, I want to just thank folks.

Even as they're heading out of the room, I wanted to acknowledge all of the visitors who came today and all of the uh folks who who came to speak and share and educate uh this body as a commission.

Um I do want to note that we are 10 minutes till three.

Um, so as a point of order, could we could we perhaps have guidance from the clerk's office whether or not a vote would be needed to extend?

Yes, thank you.

Um we would we like to take a motion to extend the meeting by one hour.

That would mean that we would up to an hour, sorry.

This is a forum if anyone raised.

Okay, great.

I'd like to make a motion to extend up to an hour.

Is there a second?

Second.

Carter Carter.

Okay.

And did we want to do a voice vote?

Yeah.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

All those who oppose.

Any abstain?

Motion passes with no commissioners in opposition and no commissioners in abstention.

Thank you, Chair Lavulo.

With that, I'll try to keep my comments till five and get this out before five.

All right.

Um I'm gonna keep mine brief.

Uh so uh thanks again to all of the attendees.

Uh I'm really fortunate to work with this, as you can see, a very hardworking staff.

Um, Melissa Saron who presented from our grants and programs team, and Donald Gensler.

Amy is also in the audience, so I just want to acknowledge all of our hardworking staff members, and uh with regards to the items that passed earlier today and that you heard.

I also want to acknowledge the commissioners who were in community and who brought themselves out to a number of those community events, those outreach opportunities, or who shared these opportunities on social media and what have you.

That engagement is is really important.

Um, so quickly on that note, the Sound Business Summit.

The deadline has been extended through tomorrow, November the 4th.

This is a creative economy initiative supported by our division and hosted by Department of Sound at Shattered Records Studios uh November 10th through the 15th.

To apply for one of these workshop evenings, you must be a Sacramento resident, uh, someone who is 18 years or older and uh a music recording artist or music-based performing artist.

I encourage folks who are out there to apply to uh to this opportunity at Department of Sound.

That's D E P T O F S O U N D.org forward slash summit.

If you are also receiving, this is a plug for our newsletter if you're receiving our newsletter or if you're connected to us on social media.

Of course, it's all over our channels as well.

You can find us at um at Sax City Arts, Instagram, Blue Sky, LinkedIn, Facebook.

Uh so the Sound Business Summit uh Summit extension of that deadline to the end of November 4th.

The Emerging Curator Fellow.

Um we are extremely pleased to announce that the 2026 Emerging Curators Fellow will be Lorena Rodriguez.

Lorena is a multidisciplinary artist, a cultural practitioner and peace educator.

You're gonna hear more about her work in the coming months.

The current exhibition that is in the Robert T.

Matsui Gallery, which is just right outside these doors, is titled We Are California.

This exhibit uplifts voices that power the world's fourth largest economy.

Uh it is curated by our current fellow NJ Mavondo.

It is currently open uh through December 17th.

Uh, just briefly about this the this set of works.

It honors the essential workers, cultural organizers, and unsung heroes whose labor and lived experiences are often left out of mainstream narratives.

So go check it out.

It is wheelchair accessible, Robert T.

Matsui Gallery.

Um I wanted to take a moment to celebrate and acknowledge Rosa Marie Orozco, also uh Rosa goes by Roma and Douglas Carter who are joining us here today for their first time as commissioners.

So I just wanted to acknowledge that and give you both a round of applause for that.

So we do have, or this body does have one remaining uh vacancy.

Uh, that is for District six.

Anyone in the community who uh who is a city of Sacramento resident, you do not have to be a resident of that district, uh, but you can go to our website and find out more information, and um I encourage folks to apply so that we can fill that seat, and this can be a fully staffed um commission body.

I also want to note that the final meeting of this year is on the second Monday of December, so we've been kind of switching between first and second uh Mondays of the month.

I just want to put it out there and make sure that it's clear.

The next meeting for folks who are interested is December 8th at 1 p.m.

Um, lastly, I wanted to acknowledge the work of this commission in helping to identify the uh the county of Sacramento's nominee for the California Arts Council's 50th anniversary award program.

This is also known as the Arts Award, as some folks may know.

Next year marks the 50th anniversary of the California Arts Council.

There will be a celebration in Sacramento uh sometime in April, I believe, and uh all of the county arts agencies were provided an opportunity to nominate one entity that could have been a art an artist, a arts leader, or an arts organization to represent their county, and the guidelines that we were provided shared that the legacy tier of the California Arts Council's individual artist fellowship awards uh that set of guidelines will be used to help identify who this may be who this individual may be.

So I just wanted to acknowledge publicly that this commission body had received information on a couple of prior legacy tier awardees.

Those two names were shared with the commission.

The commission reviewed a biographical statement, and they had nominated my majority selection, Dr.

Manuel Pickett of Teatro Espejo to be the county of Sacramento's nominee for the California Arts Council's 50th anniversary arts award, and that's all I have to share.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um next item is member comments ideas, questions, and meeting conference report.

Are there any commissioners who wish to speak?

Thank you.

And the last item is public comments matters not on the agenda.

Clerk, are there any members of the public who wish to speak on public comments?

Thank you, Chair.

Yes, I have three speakers for this item.

Our first speaker will be Lambert.

First of all, I probably won't come back to any more commissions because you were just uh, and I'll still give you the benefit of the doubt, but I will be sending this agreement, and we can't use this, and to me, that's a violation of freedom of speech.

We should be able to show you what I'm showing you here.

And they did that when a guy uh disturbed City Hall, and they stopped showing that.

But I'm gonna send this to Minti Cuppy, and all of you should read it, including the city attorney.

He should pay attention to this tells you about a no-written agreement.

You must study this before you vote unanimously to give people what they're seeking.

Uh that's a terrible precedent.

And I'm not just some wild card coming down here.

I've been coming down here a while, and it has nothing to do with vanity.

This is a principal thing.

And I heard somebody come up here and say their parents, so I'm gonna shout mine out.

My parents moved here in 1946, 1946, paying all these property taxes, and I was born in 1958.

So I know this city, I'm from here, and when I started the cheesecake business, we submitted a lot of paperwork here, and I'm a master documenter, and we have found patterns that we have no interest in being part of their values.

We just want our taxpayer monies that we qualify for.

Thank you for your comments.

Our next speaker is Mary Ellen.

Good afternoon, commissioners.

My name is Mary Ellen Lane, and I work for the City of Sacramento as an events associate in the Safe Credit Union Performing Arts District.

I'm also a district four resident.

Event associates are the frontline representatives of the city's cultural venues.

We manage public entry, safety, and patron experience at every event at the Performing Arts Center and also Memorial Auditorium.

Our work keeps these venues welcoming, professional, and safe.

The events associate or usher position is currently classified as temporary, and we are compensated at minimum wage.

I have made inquiries to management and also human resources for a wage review.

I've been told that a citywide review has been pending for years, and we um and the results have not been shared.

I am not here today to ask you for a raise because I know that's not within your purview.

What I am asking you for is to see this as a workforce equity issue.

This would help ensure event support staff are included in efforts toward fair pay and a sustainable workforce.

Thank you for your time and also for recognizing the people who make our city's cultural venues run every day.

Thank you for your comments.

Our last speaker will be Olivia.

Thank you.

Any commissioners who wish to speak on items not on the agenda?

I did want to also say welcome.

Welcome in.

We welcome Dino when he was here in the beginning.

We want to give you a warm welcome to welcome onto the commission.

If you have questions, feel free to reach out.

Anyone else have anything that they want to say before we close this out?

If not, meeting is adjourned.

Thank you, everyone.