As WGCU News has been reporting this week, the Florida Legislature’s newly approved budget includes severe cuts to cultural affairs programing. The new nearly $89 billion dollar budget would almost completely defund the Culture Builds grant program from the Division of Cultural Affairs.
The division was already receiving only about one-15th of one percent of the state budget in past years. That’s 0.06 percent, rounding up.
Lydia Black is the executive director of the nonprofit Alliance for the Arts in Fort Myers.
She joins Gulf Coast Live to talk about how this could impact not only local arts offerings but also the economic impact outside of the arts — in areas like tourism and mental health.
