COVID-19’s Staggering Economic Impact On The Arts In San Diego

Speaker 1: 00:00 New research from university of San Diego's nonprofit Institute. And the commission for arts and culture shows that the arts and culture sector is particularly hard hit by COVID shutdowns, more so than any other nonprofit sector in the region with shifting demands, loss of program, revenue, donations, and funding, plus unprecedented cuts and furloughs. We're seeing an industry in crisis KPBS arts editor and producer, Julia Dixon Evans spoke with one of the authors of the study, Laura Dietrich associate director of the nonprofit Institute. Speaker 2: 00:36 Laura, let's start with the staggering 95% of organizations reporting a loss of program-related revenue sector wide, total loss of $96.6 million 79.4 million of that from programs. So admission and tickets classes, et cetera. What have you found across the arts and culture sector in San Diego and how does it compare to other sectors? Speaker 3: 01:02 Well, in particular arts and culture organizations are what we call high contact or close proximity organizations, right? So they are, um, interacting with people on a regular basis. So they have a more difficult time shifting their programs online. Other nonprofits have been more successful at that. Although our agriculture organizations are figuring it out, but if you're tied to a building and people coming into your building to experience your art or your performance, you know, over 90% of organizations in our survey, um, as a September one were closed or only partially open. So they're just unable to generate revenue in the same ways that some other kinds of nonprofits are able to do so, especially because they rely so much on that face-to-face interaction Speaker 2: 01:50 And artists by nature, creative and problem solvers. And we saw some quick pivots in the industry and a community that's pretty hungry for art, whether for healing or escape. And I spoke with Jennifer Eve Thorne of Moxie theater who had pivoted to virtual programs almost right away. We have Speaker 3: 02:11 Had to be innovative in a way that I think theater hasn't been forced to be in a long time. And the, the cycle of innovation for theaters is speeding up. And so what's really been cool is finding a way to continue to make art, to reach and educate audiences about how to access it and realizing that this may be the solution to access to the arts that was really missing and, and making theater, uh, something that was only available to a minority of people who could afford it. Speaker 2: 02:52 Are these digital or virtual programs sustainable for organizations? Well, one we see in the data Speaker 3: 03:00 Is they are certainly an option. Um, and as the Moxie theater demonstrated, they were able to pivot quickly smaller organizations in our research tended to be able to move their programming online, or even figure out ways to do things creatively outside, or, um, you know, in venues that were open. So in that respect, those organizations, um, tended to do well. The ones that were much more tied to big buildings, um, or, you know, halls and things like that. That's, it's just a much tougher scenario. I mean, if you think of in about Comic-Con right, Comicon is a arts and culture organization, um, profit in San Diego, a huge one, uh, you know, they could not host Comicon this year. Um, they did a digital platform, but it was simply, you know, not quite the same, I think, as having all those folks at costume downtown Speaker 2: 03:55 And the sector also saw what you had called an unprecedented four in 10 layoffs or furloughs. And in this industry, particularly in the performing arts, we see, um, major use of independent contractors. And I spoke to AGA knocks of new village arts theater, a smaller nonprofit in Carlsbad who said this was their biggest hit by far. And here's their experience. Speaker 4: 04:21 Our shows are our bread and butter. And so without those, without those events, we really don't have a, a way to generate that same level of income, you know, on the flip side to employ the same number of artists and technicians and designers. And throughout the course of a year, a season, we, we could employ, you know, around 250 different people were various jobs. Speaker 2: 04:47 Laura, what's the impact here on independent contractors or shorter term gig style employees, whether at a place like new village arts or a comic con something bigger. Speaker 3: 04:58 Well, in our study, we saw that several thousand gig workers, contracts had been canceled as a result of COVID-19 the survey respondents told us that. So the begs, the larger question, you know, that's more unemployment in the region Speaker 2: 05:15 And shifting gears to philanthropy and individual donors, you showed that 65% of organizations reported a reduction in donor contributions. Again, here is Jennifer Eve, thorn of Moxie. Speaker 3: 05:29 And when this all first happened, there was an outpouring of support. And I think that as this continues, as our doors continue to remain closed, what I hope won't happen is that people will feel like they gave a year ago to support this arts organization because of the pandemic because of COVID and, and now they, they can't give again. And, and I understand that that might happen because there's so many, there's so many things to give to right now that are Speaker 2: 06:00 Okay. Laura, what did you find about COVID impact on philanthropy? Are people still giving but differently? Speaker 3: 06:08 Yeah, definitely. We see patterns of this both locally and, um, in a national poll that we just conducted with Luth research, where donors are reporting about 50% of donors are saying they're giving, they're giving isn't changing, but at the other 50% are saying we are changing our giving. Um, and we're changing the kinds of organizations that we're giving to. And in those cases, we were definitely seeing a falloff in giving to arts and culture organizations and a preference for more immediate need kinds of organizations like food banks and, um, you know, health services, things related to COVID. So the other problem, I think that organizations are having is initially, although, uh, the previous speaker talked about an outpouring of support, I'm really glad for them. I don't think that's been the case across all arts or cultural organizations, especially those that are smaller, that don't have access to digital fundraising platforms who really relied on face-to-face fundraising opportunities. They were definitely, um, shuttered and sidelined, and I think I've felt a real impact in terms of being able to attract individual donations. Speaker 2: 07:19 And you're seeing that the impacts of the pandemic on the arts may stick around for a while, like with a reduction of demand, for example, what are some of the factors that will make this a long lasting impact? Speaker 3: 07:32 Well, I think it's the same as it is for a lot of institutions. Just figuring out how to open, how to open safely the cost of reopening in this study. Uh, the participants estimated the cost of reopening to be $65 million just to get buildings, opening, functioning, working, um, and then to hire back employees who maybe have moved on to other, um, to other opportunities for work. So reopening the arts and culture sector will be, it will be difficult, and it will be a longer term thing than just sort of flipping on the switch and opening the doors. Speaker 2: 08:06 And maybe artists are also optimist by nature, but time and again, I see organizations taking the time to check priorities or work on things like equity. Here's Debra, [inaudible] the museum of photographic arts with some insight to their approach to looking forward and looking ahead. Speaker 5: 08:26 So what we spend doing is trying to figure out what a nonprofit museum looks like in these kinds of circumstances. We've had to learn to evolve and think differently, not just about how we function now, but what we're going to be when we reopened, because any nonprofit that thinks they're going to be the same only just with a delay is schooling themselves. Speaker 2: 08:55 These findings overall are really grim, but I'm wondering what else you've seen, like MOBAs outlook here that can suggest some sort of hope for the arts and culture sector, Speaker 3: 09:08 Sort of the flip side of the coin of a large disaster. Like this is that you have opportunity to innovate. And we have seen it all across the nonprofit sector, not just in the arts and culture sector, a lot of innovative approaches to collaboration, new ways of doing things. It's really kind of opened up folks, eyes to the opportunities through the tech world. You know, I would say that if you just drive around San Diego, you can see that arts culture humanities is just ingrained in our city. They're a huge part of our brand. So they'll always be with us. They need some caretaking right now. They need some attention from folks that believe in that part of our sector, that, that, um, they need support and need people to give to them. I think for right now, that would be a great way to, to sort of hold off, hold the boundaries right now while we're waiting. Speaker 1: 10:00 That's Laura Dietrich researcher and associate director of the nonprofit Institute, which just published culture shift, measuring COVID-19 impact on San Diego arts and culture nonprofits speaking with KPBS arts editor and producer Julia Dixon Evans. You're listening to KPBS midday edition.