15 September 1997

TO: Mayor Howard Peak
Mayor of San Antonio, TX

FROM: Professor Jill Dolan, President
Association for Theatre in Higher Education
jdolan@email.gc.cuny.edu

Dear Mayor Howard Peak,

As the President of a major national association planning to hold a conference on theatre in your city this August, I'm writing to express my outrage at your city council's decision to reduce arts funding by 15%, and its decision to deny all funding to the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center.

The Association for Theatre in Higher Education is a national professional organization that now boasts close to 2,000 members. We are college and university professors and instructors, training students in the ethical and  free expression of the arts as a vital component of culture in the United States.

We have planned to hold our 1998 conference in San Antonio, but the actions of your city council have prompted serious discussion among the members of our Governing Council as to the appropriateness of our choice. Our conferences often attract 1500 people. We have to weigh our consciences to decide whether we can support bringing to San Antonio over a million tourist dollars when your public officials have spoken disparagingly of the arts' importance, and have so unjudiciously cut its funding.

Your actions have set your local arts groups against each other, creating a climate of competition that's divisive rather than supportive of the cultural diversity in which we understood your city takes pride. By fanning the flames of controversy around one particular progressive organization, you have created an atmosphere in which certain of your citizens are demonized at the expense of others. Your intention to reward local arts groups for bringing in tourist dollars, rather than for fostering a spirit of free expression and diversity tips the balance in favor of economics, and devalues the ethical and social dimension the arts bring to our culture.

When Councilperson Rick Vasquez likens arts funding to having extra money to go to the movies, he cheapens the role the arts play in our development as people who understand how to express ourselves and our cultural uniqueness through public media such as theatre, film, and the visual arts. The arts, we at ATHE believe, are not superfluous, but a vital part of education and social customs for all Americans.

The arts are not the purview of "special interests." As ATHE's recently published document, "Theatre Studies in Higher Education: Learning for a Lifetime" demonstrates, they are an integral part of a rich educational and   social process that teaches people widely applicable professional and cultural skills. To devalue the arts, and to slash its funding, demonstrates a shortsightedness and a lack of understanding we cannot condone.

Our Governing Council is discussing how to proceed with plans for our conference at this juncture. I can't impress upon you enough how much we regret the outcome of your budget vote, and urge you to do everything in your power to restore the 15% cut in arts funding and to refund the important cultural work of the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center.

Sincerely,

Prof. Jill Dolan
President
Association for Theatre in Higher Education