From Voice of San Diego / May 27, 2026
When Mayor Todd Gloria first proposed eliminating grants that support arts institutions and community programming in the city’s budget, many of us in the arts community were deeply concerned. The proposed $11.8 million reduction to arts funding—an 86.6% cut—would have a significant impact on organizations and programs that serve hundreds of thousands of San Diegans each year.
Arts and culture contribute so much to the economic vitality and civic life of our region, but these proposed cuts threaten the ability of arts organizations to continue to play that role into the future.
When the mayor later released his revised budget in May, however, no funding was restored for arts and culture. Indeed, as funds were found for other areas of the budget, the arts were left behind. For many in the sector this was profoundly discouraging and intensified fears about the future stability of arts programming. It raises significant concerns about the city’s priorities and our collective future.
City arts and culture funding does not bankroll lavish galas or extravagant productions. It supports community theater in neighborhoods that otherwise have little access to the arts. It supports programs inside public schools, where arts education has already been hollowed out. It exposes families to museums, nature programs and hands-on discovery. It makes possible writing and performance workshops for veterans, youth music programs, cultural festivals, and free performances in public spaces.
It sustains the smallest organizations—grassroots groups operating on limited resources that could not continue without this support—while ensuring larger institutions that anchor the sector can continue to provide jobs and partnership opportunities to smaller organizations.
Cuts of this magnitude would reverberate far beyond the arts community, reducing access to education, cultural experiences, and community programming in neighborhoods throughout San Diego, while weakening a sector that plays an important role in the city’s economic and civic life.
The May Revise identified additional Transit Occupancy Tax revenue of $13.5M, just larger than the arts funding cut. But despite this identification of new revenue, no money was added back into the arts. This is a brutal bit of irony. Historically, the fiscal principle behind the budget has been to sustain arts and culture organizations with a small fraction of the very tourism economy that they help create and sustain. Visitors come here not only for sunshine and conventions. They come for the vibrancy of this city’s culture—its theaters, museums, music, festivals, galleries, public art, and creative life.
Instead of supporting the arts, the $13.5-million increase is going toward an additional 44 full-time city employees. It is going toward purchasing dozens of new cars for the city fleet. And it is going to a new club house at the Torrey Pines golf course. This is where city leadership has prioritized our limited dollars.
According to the city’s own figures, arts and culture represent a nearly $1.2 billion sector in San Diego—an extraordinary return on a modest public investment. Yet despite the economic impact and broad community benefit, the proposed budget would dramatically reduce support for one of the very institutions and industries that help make San Diego globally competitive, economically dynamic, and culturally vibrant.
The responsibility shifts to the City Council, now. And with it, the hope of our creative ecosystem that together we rectify this budget and what it says about our city’s priorities.
Arts funding is not ornamental spending. It is an investment: in education, public life, neighborhood vitality, tourism, and civic identity. It is an investment in people.
America’s Finest City should not be the one retreating from arts and culture. The Council still has time to restore these critical funds before permanent and irreversible damage is done, and we plead with them to help us keep this critical programing alive for all of San Diego’s families.
Signed,
- Barry Edelstein of the Old Globe,
- Jessica Hanson York of the Mingei International Museum,
- Todd Schultz of The Conrad Prebys Performing Arts Center,
- Debby Buchholz of the La Jolla Playhouse,
- Martha Gilmer of the San Diego Symphony and Radys Shell at Jacobs Park,
- Judy Gradwohl of the San Diego Natural History Museum,
- Steven Snyder of the Fleet Science Center,
- David Bennett of the San Diego Opera,
- Rekha Kapania of the San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art,
- Tim Shields of the Old Globe,
- Roxana Velasquez of the San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art
