Social services, arts hit by possible Fort Worth funding cuts

By Scott Nishimura

snishimura@star-telegram.com

FORT WORTH -- A variety of social service agencies and arts organizations could lose money from proposed cuts in the city's 2013 budget, and the press is on to spare the programs from cuts.

The Arts Council of Fort Worth & Tarrant County, for one, which could lose $266,564 of its $1.06 million in 2012 funding, is proposing that the City Council redirect money from hotel taxes to the arts. That fund is projected to finish the current fiscal year with a $10 million surplus.

"We don't want to hurt any of our partners," Arts Council President Jody Ulich said Wednesday, referring to the Will Rogers Memorial Center, the Fort Worth Convention & Visitors Bureau, and the Convention Center, the beneficiaries of the hotel taxes. "We think this is a perfect time to insert the arts into the [hotel] tax, because we are not going to be hurting our partners."

The surplus is already earmarked for Will Rogers and the Convention Center, city Budget Officer Horatio Porter said.

The council has discretion, however, to say the arts can receive hotel taxes, which are restricted for uses that generate hotel stays, he said.

Mayor Betsy Price said in an interview Tuesday that the staff's proposed $583 million general fund was built around the city's basic needs of public safety, infrastructure and water. "There's no significant cuts in [city services] and hopefully no layoffs," she said. "Now we have to see exactly what the council wants."

The council is scheduled to vote Sept. 18 on a final budget. It heads into a two-day budget retreat at City Hall today.

The proposed budget closed a projected $49 million funding gap largely by using $40 million in unbudgeted revenue increases and savings from this year.

The remaining $9 million in proposed cuts includes more than $800,000 to the Arts Council, United Way of Tarrant County, the city's Directions Home homelessness program, the Coming Up Gang intervention program with the Boys & Girls Clubs, and the Fort Worth black and Hispanic chambers of commerce.

City funds make up a big portion of the Arts Council's pie. The organization, which makes grants to arts groups, has a $480,000 private fundraising goal this year, up from $448,703 raised last year.

City funding to the Arts Council reached $1.3 million in 2010 and fell to $1.01 million and $1.06 million the last two years.

The Arts Council's case to the city: Arts generate business and employment, including hotel stays.

"We find this is what a lot of cities contribute to," Ulich said.

The city's funding to the United Way goes to five programs: Tarrant County Youth Collaboration, addressing child abuse and neglect; SafeHaven of Tarrant County, domestic violence; Women's Center of Tarrant County, rape crisis; Recovery Resource Council, drug and alcohol abuse; and Tarrant County Mental Health Mental Retardation.

The proposed cut: $70,250, with $210,750 remaining in the budget. The city asked the United Way several years ago to administer a pot of money to the groups, and first-year funding was a total $345,000, United Way President Tim McKinney said.

"In today's nonprofit world, every dollar counts," McKinney said. "We have been able to negotiate [with the city], and we will try to negotiate this time. I think we have an obligation to do that on behalf of the agencies."

SafeHaven CEO Mary Lee Hafley said the $90,000 in annual city funds supports the agency's Fort Worth shelter.

SafeHaven has already taken more than $250,000 in United Way cuts the last three years, not including the city piece, Hafley said. The United Way annual proceeds are now $167,000 annually, not including Fort Worth's funding. The agency, whose annual budget is less than $6.5 million, has looked to government grants and contracts, private fundraising and cuts in its own spending to close the gap, Hafley said.

"We have not cut a whole program or a whole service," she said. "But now we're at a point of [asking] are there programs or services that enhance what we do, but maybe aren't essential?"

The proposed cut in Directions Home funding is $239,336, with $2.15 million remaining in the budget.

The Presbyterian Night Shelter is receiving $154,803 from the program this year.

"It'll be very important how the city" distributes the potential cut, said Toby Owen, the shelter's executive director. "The last place they should cut is these organizations that provide a direct link to helping people end their homelessness."

>Proposed budget cuts>

City staff proposed several cuts in contract funding to help balance next year's budget.

Source: City of Fort Worth

Scott Nishimura, 817-390-7808

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