Emergency funds coming for Lexington arts affected by COVID-19 outbreak

Lexington arts organizations and individual artists are facing deepening financial trouble due to the near-shutdown of programming due to the coronavirus pandemic. Among the hardest hit is the Lexington Philharmonic, which announced Thursday that it’s canceling the rest of its 2019-20 season, including two major concerts that the orchestra had hoped to reschedule this spring.

But help is on the way from federal, state and local sources, according to featured participants in a digital Town Hall on the state of the local arts during the COVID-19 crisis, hosted Thursday online by CivicLex. Much of the meeting was devoted to informing about 65 arts group representatives about the emergency funding resources available in a time when ticket sales and most other revenue streams have ground to a temporary halt.

Loans funded by the U.S. Government as part of the recently passed CARES Act will begin to be available through the Small Business Administration’s Payroll Protection Program soon, said Emily B. Moses, executive staff advisor at the Kentucky Arts Council. She added that about 40 percent of the $75 million in newly approved grant funds at the National Endowment for the Arts will be distributed through state arts agencies including the KAC.

On the local level, LexArts interim president Ame Sweetall gave the Town Hall participants a sneak preview of a special emergency fund for Lexington-based groups and individual artists. The as-yet-untitled fund, which will be formally announced next week, will be administered through the Bluegrass Community Foundation and involve a pared-down application process and rapid response from LexArts.

“We’ve secured significant funds and will be looking at the applications in terms of helping artists who are in true need of emergency funds for things like food and housing,” LexArts communications director Maury Sparrow said in an interview after the Town Hall. “This relief fund is to make sure people survive. Our goal is to write checks and get them in the mail as quickly as we can, which will be in a matter of weeks if not sooner.”

The emergency fund is separate from LexArts’ ongoing Fund for the Arts drive, Sparrow noted. “When the pandemic struck, we were very nervous about the idea of running two campaigns concurrently,” he said. “But we’re very bullish on both fronts. A lot of nonprofits fear that their funding resources will decrease during this crisis, but in fact, we’re finding that a majority of people are in the mood to give even more.”

That has been true at the Philharmonic, where a donor-advised fund at the BCF has stepped in to provide bridge funding to keep orchestra staff and musicians employed, Kaiser said.

In addition, like Lexington Children’s Theatre and other groups that have canceled performances in compliance with social distancing guidelines, the Philharmonic is now asking season subscribers and other ticket-holders to donate the cost of their canceled tickets and/or make an additional donation. The early response has been positive, Kaiser said.

“It’s an incredible moment for us, incredibly heartwarming,” Kaiser said. “We want to still be when this pandemic passes, and we have immense gratitude for those who are stepping up to help us make that happen.”

At the same time, the Philharmonic and other Lexington arts groups are ramping up alternative programming online and elsewhere.

AthensWest Theatre producing director Bo List, another featured participant in the digital Town Hall, confirmed that the company plans to remount its recent production of Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest” as a radio play to be broadcast on WUKY FM in the fairly near future.

List said the production is being rehearsed remotely on Zoom now and will be recorded and broadcast with the performers never having left their living respective rooms.

“We’re trying to balance the needs of our audience with those of our artists,” he said. “We want to make sure everyone is complete safe, but we also don’t want our artistic muscles to atrophy. In the end, the show may not bring in a lot of money, but it will keep the cords that bind us to the community very strong.”