As we enter the New Year, Congress commences a new session. There are many important issues on the docket: the possible repeal of the Obama Health Care Reform, the Open Internet Order, and overall spending. However, the issue most important to me is funding for the National Endowment for the Arts, a public agency dedicated to bringing the arts to all Americans. The NEA is the largest annual national funder of the arts. A strong connection to arts education, the NEA helps to fund and carry out educational initiatives, such as The Big Read, which gives communities the opportunity to read and discuss one of 31 selections from the U.S. and world literary cannon.
In fiscal year (FY) 2010, the NEA was granted $167.5 million to be disbursed to arts organizations, new and established, throughout the United States. This past February President Obama proposed a $6.4 million decrease for the FY 2011 NEA budget. The House of the Interior Appropriations Subcommittee, chaired by Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA), raised the initial funding level to $170 million this past July. This is $2.5 million increase over the budget allotment in FY 2010. The money the Federal government budgets for the NEA each year helps to fund jobs, create safe and educational places for our children to stay after school, enrich the lives of Americans, and increase our cultural worth in world. While I could write hundreds of thousands of pages lauding the work of the NEA, I am here to ask each reader to contact his or her elected officials and ask them to support the increase to $170 million dollars for the NEA in FY 2011. With five minutes of your time, you can help to support the arts in America. Please click here to visit the Americans for the Arts advocacy page to contact your elected officials.
Caro
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