‘Arts Czar’ Proposed To Promote Oneonta

Miller Uneasy About Creating City Office

By JIM KEVLIN

Mayor Miller has shown himself to be a decisive guy.
But at mid-week he was still pondering what to do next after 86 members of Oneonta’s creative community engaged in lively debate Saturday morning, Jan. 22, at an Arts Summit the mayor hosted in the Foothills Performing Arts & Civic Center’s atrium.
As the morning began, Miller reported the city’s budget contains $2-3 million of unencumbered surplus, some of which might be available for one of his signature initiatives:  Using the arts as a magnet to bring tourists – and outside money – into the community.
“A quarter-million dollars is not a lot of money to spend on what I call community improvement,” he said, (adding at another point, “I’m not in it for the arts; I’m in it for the economy.”
The mayor reported reviewing two strategic plans developed in the 1990s that concluded Oneonta’s arts community – music, theater, dance, painting, artisanship – would be a fine foundation for economic development.
“It just never went anywhere,” Miller said.
Primed, attendees at 10 tables of eight conferred on how things might move forward and, reporting back after 45 minutes, proposed such innovations as an “arts czar” or a City Hall Office of Arts & Culture.
“What have we been lacking?” asked Kathy Tobiassen, Orpheus Theatre president.  “A point person in city government.  What is the city going to do for us?”
“My first reaction is ‘no,’” said Miller, who has assumed the role of interim chairman of the board of financially troubled Foothills,.  “But that’s just by first reaction.”
Still, “the consensus seems to be the city needs to lead this activity.”
The gathering included a broad spectrum of the Oneonta arts community, from the UCCCA to the Franklin Stage to the colleges.
SUNY Oneonta President Nancy Kleniewski attended, as did Bob Brzozowski from the Greater Oneonta Historical Society, Jon Weiss from Oneonta Theatre, and four of the seven aldermen.
The following Tuesday, Miller, in an interview, said he was still not inclined to create a city position, since that would require an unwieldy hiring process.
“I’m being very careful about the next step,” he said, “because it could derail it or advance it.”
Some 10-12 Arts Summit participants had already volunteered to join a task force to move the initiative forward, but Miller was considering whether to staff the initiative through an existing entity – Main Street Oneonta, for instance – create a new organization, or identify an individual with the heft and leadership skills to move matters forward.
He also pointed out that any decision is not his alone, since Common Council would have to approve any expenditure, and he would need to present clear goals and measurements of success.
“I think I can make the case and the council will go along with it,” he said.  “I don’t think there will be a lot of opposition.”
But, he added, “I still have to define ‘it.’”