A foggy Nuit Blanche
Organizers need to step up and build some excitement for the proposed art festival
Peter Simpson, The Ottawa Citizen
Haven’t heard much about Nuit Blanche Ottawa since a public meeting was held a couple of weeks ago.
The meeting was organized by Bravo-Est, the local branch of a provincewide independent group of artists. The group got seed money from the Ontario Trillium Foundation to launch Nuit Blanche events — the overnight festivals of contemporary art, mostly outdoors — in several Ontario cities, including Ottawa.
The meeting at La Nouvelle Scene on King Edward Street attracted about 60 people, who asked a lot of thoughtful questions and, in some cases, publicly declared their support for a Nuit Blanche in Ottawa. Bravo-Est should be capitalizing on this momentum as immediately and publicly as possible, but since the meeting there’s been hardly a peep that I can hear.
Festivals & Events in Ontario Drive $2.3 billion in GDP + 52,700 jobs + 1.1 billion in taxes generated
[Source: press release]
Festivals & Events Ontario (FEO) released new research Study information confirming the importance of festivals/events to the Ontario economy in terms of this industry’’s ability to contribute to regional GDP, create jobs and generate taxes at all levels of government.
Ontario festivals/events are estimated to annually drive $2.3 billion in contribution to regional GDP, support 52,700 full-year job equivalents (FYJE) and generate $1.1 billion in taxes.
The Study was conducted by a partnership of FEO, the Ontario Trillium Foundation and Enigma Research. It provided detailed information on a sample of 48 of the Province’’s approximately 1,750 smaller-budget festivals/events (Note: these < $250K budget level celebrations represent over 85% of the overall industry). Collectively, this “small budget” sector generated $1 billion in GDP, a number that compares quite favorably to the additional GDP collectively generated by the approximately 30 Ontario festivals & events that operate at the $1 million+ budget level.
Data from this Study was integrated with secondary research on the impact of mid-sized and large-budget events that was previously conducted by Enigma to arrive at the first such Ontario-wide estimate confirming the aggregate economic impact of festivals and events operating at all budgetary levels.
Not-for-Profit Sector Mergers: Not a Four-Letter Word
Viola Dessanti and Jenn Miller, Ontario Trillium Foundation
Mergers have long occupied a complicated place within the not-for-profit sector. On one hand, not-for-profit organizations may pursue them to increase impact and improve service while increasing efficiencies over the long term. On the other hand, mergers have often been perceived as funder driven and emblematic of a loss of identity and autonomy — even a sense of failure.
In the face of increased competition for resources, however, and particularly since the recession, more nonprofits are seeing mergers as necessary and even valuable.
Through the Ontario Trillium Foundation’s (OTF) Challenging Times research, community roundtables, collaboration symposium, and research project, we’ve engaged the sector in a dialogue around its response to the economic downturn and the future of the sector.
We’ve heard that collaboration is increasing and the sector is experimenting with different forms of strategic restructuring, such as shared services or spaces.
Yet while there seems to be a great deal of excitement around collaboration, there is little information and dialogue around actual mergers in Ontario, despite the increase of mergers and acquisitions in the province.
Between April 1, 2004 and June 30, 2010, OTF alone approved 15 grants worth close to $1.3M into Ontario communities for projects related to mergers and amalgamations. Through these grants, we learned that merging is complex and a long-term commitment that requires time and careful consideration by those involved.
We have also learned that the effects can be very powerful.
Read more on the Charity Village website: Not-for-Profit Sector Mergers
Ontario Trillium Foundation: What would it take to transform economic opportunities for Ontario youth?
How would you answer this question?
What would it take to transform economic opportunities for Ontario youth?
By adding your voice, you will be a part of a brief, but broad consultation over the summer. Your ideas will help to shape the future direction of OTF’s work benefiting Ontario’s youth.
Not only will you have the opportunity to post your own idea, you will be able to browse and comment on others and vote on your favourites.
Swing into summer: The ‘feel-good-Ottawa festival season’ is here
Lynn Saxberg, The Ottawa Citizen
Marc Charron gets a warm fuzzy feeling when he thinks about summertime in Ottawa. That’s peak festival season, of course, and being able to see fantastic concerts outdoors night after night is one of Charron’s favourite things about his hometown.
Published: Thursday, May 06, 2010
