Cuyahoga County announces $4m in CARES Act relief funding for arts and culture sector

Cuyahoga County Executive Armond Budish announced at a press conference Fri. Oct. 16 that $4 million in funding will be made available to the county’s arts and culture sector through the CARES Act. Two-thirds of the funding ($2.7 million) will be distributed to arts and culture organizations through Cuyahoga Arts and Culture, and 1/3 ($1.3 million) will be distributed to individual artists and for-profit performing arts venues and artists through Arts Cleveland.

“We’ve helped Cuyahoga County residents with rent relief and we’ve supported small businesses through our stabilization fund, but there’s one sector we haven’t really talked about — arts and culture,” said Budish. “Together, this sector produces $1.3 billion in economic impact, and it employs 10,000 people — or it used to, because once Covid hit, more than 1/3 of these employees lost their jobs.”

Stressing that the sector has lost a greater percentage of employees than any other industry, Budish added, “Arts and culture is really the heart and soul of our region. Even though we’re experiencing one of the grimmest times in our history, we must emerge with our region intact and we must become even stronger. We must not lose our identity.”

Budish has asked Cuyahoga County Council president Dan Brady to sign off on an emergency request for $4 million. To be eligible, entities or individuals must be able to show that they’ve endured losses due to Covid-19, that their mission is arts and culture, and that their losses have not been addressed by the Paycheck Protection Program or any other program.

More information available on the website arts-cares.com.