The fiscal year 2019 findings are based on 633 survey responses that were collected from participating local arts agencies (LAAs) during May through August of 2019.

Local Arts Agencies by the Numbers in 2019:

  • 95% use the arts to address community development issues such as social, education, or economic challenges.

  • 83% expect the demand for their services to increase over the next two years.

  • 76% provide arts education programs and/or services to the community.

  • 76% provide financial support directly to organizations and/or artists in any form such as grants, contracts start-up capital, loans/microloans, and/or commissions/fellowships/ scholarships—63% to organizations, and 65% to individual artists

  • 70% are private nonprofit organizations; 30 percent are government agencies.

    • 58% operate a competitive grantmaking program—55% award grants to organizations, and 39% award grants to individual artists.

  • 64% report that their operating budget increased or remained the same from FY2018 to FY2019 (54 percent and 10 percent, respectively); 36 percent experienced a decrease in their operating budget.

  • 62% manage one or more cultural facilities (e.g., performance or exhibition spaces, arts centers, galleries, incubators).

  • 54% manage a public art program; 33% of those manage a percent-for-art program.

  • 49% work in partnerships with their local Chamber of Commerce.

  • 49% have adopted a diversity, equity, and inclusion statement.

  • 49% work in communities that have integrated the arts into a community-wide planning effort such as a city’s master plan or a community foundation’s regional needs assessment.

  • 34% report that their community has completed (or updated) a community cultural plan within the past five years


Reports: 2019 Profile of Local Arts Agencies

Reports: 2019 Supplemental Modules

The Local Arts Agency Dashboard

The Local Arts Agency Dashboard lets you compare your organization to another LAA or to a group of LAAs with similar characteristics. You can customize graphs based on characteristics like budget, service area population, legal status, or state.

Infographics

Additional Local Arts Agency Resources