Somerville Cultural Trust Strategy

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Somerville Cultural Trust Strategy

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Somerville Cultural Trust Strategy
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Somerville Cultural Trust Strategy

The Metropolitan Area Planning Council's (MAPC) Arts and Culture Department, in partnership with the Somerville Arts Council, has completed Phase One of the Somerville Cultural Trust Strategy.

This effort will support the City of Somerville in implementing the Somerville Arts Space Risk Assessment recommendation to “establish a process for the City to proactively acquire and disburse properties for Arts and Creative Enterprise (ACE) uses.”

In addition, the project furthers the goals of the Making Space for Art project, which identified policies and programs that Somerville, Boston, and Cambridge could adopt to preserve and expand cultural spaces.  

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Phase One:
Background Research

Phase Two:
Engagement and Strategy

Questions?
Lourdes Alvarez Silva
Assistant Director of Arts and Culture
[email protected]

Phase One: Background Research

During Phase One, the project team focused on researching policy tools currently in use by the City of Somerville to aggregate funding and to acquire, develop, and manage real property.

Goal:
The goal of this effort was to identify whether any existing policy tools could be used by the City to achieve its three priorities related to cultural space:

Read the Phase One Memo to learn more about the research findings and recommendations.

Access the Memo

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Aggregate funding that can be carried over across fiscal years to support the preservation
and expansion of cultural space.

Icon of a building with a paint palette over the building.

Acquire, hold, and manage properties reserved for cultural use.

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Establish and maintain structures of accountability to the Somerville arts community.

Phase Two: Community Engagement and Cultural Trust Strategy

As we move into Phase II, the work will shift toward designing governance structures, clarifying revenue streams, and establishing priorities for distributing funding and property. This phase will involve community engagement with municipal staff, local artists, arts advocates, and policy experts to evaluate potential cultural trust models to inform a home-rule petition.  

In addition to the work on this memo, the Arts and Culture Department has been proactively advocating in favor of the proposed Creative Space Act (H.3587/S.2334). If it passes, this new legislation will enable municipalities statewide to establish creative space trusts.