Citizen Artist Baltimore is back!
Mark your calendar for the March 26th Mayoral Candidates’ Forum on Arts and Culture from 5:30 to 7:30 PM, Falvey Hall in The Brown Center on the campus of Maryland Institute College of Art.
Baltimore is home to thousands of voters who are artists, arts consumers, and employees in both the arts and humanities sectors. They are known to care about core civic issues like violence reduction and education, however their votes can also be strongly influenced by candidates’ positions on arts and culture.
Citizen Artist Baltimore (CAB), a broad-based, nonpartisan get-out-the-vote coalition, was established in the 2016 election cycle with the leadership of the Greater Baltimore Cultural Alliance, Maryland Citizens for the Arts, Maryland Institute College of Art, and The Robert W. Deutsch Foundation. The goals of CAB are to integrate cultural voices into the electoral process, encourage voter registration and voting, and to engage on issues of critical importance to Baltimore City.
In 2016, a standing room only crowd of more than 600 people attended the first-ever Mayoral Candidates Forum on Arts and Culture. Since that time, CAB findings were incorporated into the recommendations of the transition team’s Subcommittee on Arts and Culture for then Mayor Catherine Pugh. These findings were also an important part of the investigations of the Mayor’s Task Force on Art Safe Space, as a result of which funds have been raised and policies realigned. The concept of a strategic cultural plan has risen in the discussions, and the cultural sector is better understood as one of Baltimore’s most significant assets (see the influence of CAB in the upcoming Visit Baltimore campaign).
What’s next? CAB will circulate a questionnaire to the candidates, and the responses will be published to the CAB website with links to the Greater Baltimore Cultural Alliance and Maryland Citizens for the Arts. These publications will inform thousands of arts supporters and voters about candidate positions. The coalition’s 2020 Mayoral Forum on Arts and Culture will take place on Thursday, March 26th. Listening sessions will continue through June 2020 in locations around the city.
To get involved and for more information, including updates on the Mayoral Forum and announcements on 2020 CAB listening sessions, check out our EventBrite (Click Here to Learn More About the 2020 Mayoral Forum), like us on facebook, and follow us on twitter @citizenartbmore. #CitizenArtistBmore
Website: http://citizenartist.vote
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/citizenartistbaltimore
Twitter: https://twitter.com/citizenartbmore
Hashtag: #citizenartistbmore
