WASHINGTON, D.C., December 15, 2006 -- A first-of-its-kind comprehensive statistical portrait of cultural vitality—ranging from community festivals to financial contributions—finds metropolitan areas on both coasts and in the Midwest earning top honors. Developed by an Urban Institute research team, the portrait's seven measures illuminate the intersection of arts, culture, and community well-being.
The San Francisco region ranked number 1 on three of the measures (each reflecting activity per 1,000 residents): nonprofit arts organizations, artist jobs, and employment in commercial and nonprofit arts establishments. Washington, D.C., was tops in nonprofit arts spending and contributions. Metropolitan Los Angeles led in commercial arts establishments, while Columbus, Ohio, had the most nonprofit community celebrations, festivals, fairs, and parades.
Other metropolitan areas among the top 10 on one or more measures were Austin, Texas; Baltimore; Boston; Hartford, Connecticut; Kansas City, Missouri-Kansas; Las Vegas; Miami; Milwaukee; Minneapolis-St. Paul; Nashville, Tennessee; Nassau-Suffolk, New York; New Haven, Connecticut; New York City; Norfolk-Virginia Beach, Virginia; Oakland, California; Orlando, Florida; Portland, Oregon—Vancouver, Washington; Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill, North Carolina; Rochester, New York; San Diego; Seattle; and West Palm Beach-Boca Raton, Florida.
In creating their rankings, researchers Maria Rosario Jackson, Florence Kabwasa-Green, and Joaquín Herranz used 2003 data from the U.S. Census Bureau, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and the Urban Institute's National Center for Charitable Statistics. Their report, "Cultural Vitality in Communities: Interpretation and Indicators" scans the nation's 61 largest metropolitan areas and ranks the top 50 of these by each measure. It is available at http://www.urban.org/url.cfm?id=311392.
"Arts and culture in all of their kaleidoscopic forms can be dynamic catalysts for reviving urban neighborhoods and advancing the quality of life there," said Jackson. "Using a broad mix of measurement tools means that urban planners, community leaders, private developers, and politicians will have a richer picture of a community's cultural vitality—what it has to offer and what it may lack."
A Wide View of Cultural Vitality
Calling upon results from earlier Urban Institute studies, the researchers defined cultural vitality to encompass cultural assets and activities that people around the country—including those in low- and moderate-income, minority, and immigrant communities—say are significant. Specifically, cultural vitality is defined as "evidence of creating, disseminating, validating, and supporting arts and culture as a dimension of everyday life in communities." As a result, ballet, opera, park-based drumming circles, quilting bees, amateur bands, poetry slams, and street murals, among other kinds of artistic and creative expression, are part of the arts and culture picture.
"This new definition recognizes the centrality of those who are not necessarily arts experts or professionals," said Jackson. "It has the potential for engaging a more diverse and powerful set of stakeholders in making sure a community has what it needs to be culturally vital."
For example, the researchers pointed out, urban designers and planners who embrace this broad definition will take more pains to ensure that neighborhoods have community or cultural centers that make possible a wide range of arts participation. Similarly, the design of cultural facilities and districts would take into account opportunities for varied publics not only to consume arts and culture, but also to engage in their creation.
Cultural Observations
The top-ranked regions for commercial arts organizations were, not surprisingly, those with high concentrations of related industries, such as Los Angeles (with its film, television, and music companies) and Nashville (with its music operations). With their high density of cultural industries, San Francisco and New York also showed up. These four metropolitan areas had the highest proportion of all local jobs in the arts, reflecting their top rankings for commercial arts establishments.
In the arena of nonprofit arts organizations, San Francisco and New York were again among the top 10, while Los Angeles and Nashville were not. In addition to New York and San Francisco, Seattle, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Portland-Vancouver, and New Haven ranked among the top 10 metropolitan areas for both commercial and nonprofit arts entities.
A much different list of regions ranked among the top 10 for nonprofit community celebrations. Following Columbus, Ohio, the leading areas were Austin, Kansas City, Milwaukee, Hartford, Baltimore, Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill, Boston, New Haven, and Rochester.
Arts and Culture in the Neighborhood
"Cultural Vitality in Communities" is the latest publication from the Arts and Culture Indicators Project (ACIP), an initiative of the Urban Institute's Culture, Creativity, and Communities Program. Launched in the late 1990s with support from the Rockefeller Foundation, ACIP develops quantifiable measures of arts and culture to provide policymakers and others with information about how these pursuits affect neighborhood conditions, community dynamics, and the vibrancy of cities and their economies. The cultural vitality report presents recommendations for analysts including arts and culture indicators in quality-of-life measurements.
ACIP is working with governmental and private agencies in Boston, California's Central Valley, Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Seattle, and Washington, D.C., to integrate arts and culture indicators in quality-of-life assessments. The Public Health Department for Seattle and King County and its local partners, for instance, use arts data in their "Communities Count: Social and Health Indicators" report.
While each measure explored in "Cultural Vitality in Communities" is intended to reveal a different facet of a region’s creative environment, the Arts and Culture Indicators Project team is conducting additional analysis that might lead to a composite index and the integration of other measures.
"Cultural Vitality in Communities: Interpretation and Indicators," by Maria Rosario Jackson, Florence Kabwasa-Green, and Joaquín Herranz, was funded by the Rockefeller Foundation. Jackson, the report's lead author, is director of the Urban Institute's Culture, Creativity, and Communities Program and a senior research associate in the Institute's Metropolitan Housing and Communities Policy Center. Kabwasa-Green is a consulting research associate at the Institute, as is Herranz, an assistant professor in the School of Public Affairs at the University of Washington.
The Urban Institute is a nonprofit, nonpartisan policy research and educational organization that examines the social, economic, and governance challenges facing the nation.
Recommended Reading
Cultural Vitality in Communities: Interpretation and Indicators. Maria Rosario Jackson, Florence Kabwasa-Green, and Joaquín Herranz. 2006.
Culture Counts in Communities: A Framework for Measurement. Maria Rosario Jackson and Joaquín Herranz. 2002.
Investing in Creativity: A Study of the Support Structure for U.S. Artists. Maria Rosario Jackson, Florence Kabwasa-Green, Daniel Swenson, Joaquín Herranz, Kadija Ferryman, Caron Atlas, Eric Wallner, and Carole E. Rosenstein. 2003.
Rebuilding the Cultural Vitality of New Orleans. Maria Rosario Jackson. 2006.
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