EQUIFLASH [THE CANADIAN CONFERENCE OF THE ARTS TO CLOSE DOORS AFTER 67 YEARS]

[CAEA e-drive]

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THE CANADIAN CONFERENCE OF THE ARTS TO CLOSE DOORS AFTER 67 YEARS
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The Canadian Conference of the Arts / Conférence canadienne des arts distributed the following media release earlier today. Equity is deeply saddened at necessity of the CCA to close its doors. As a key stakeholder in the CCA, the Association supports the outreach efforts underway to re-build this invaluable cultural policy resource. 
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Message from the Chair
Dear friends and colleagues,

It is with great sadness that the Board of Governors of the CCA came to the conclusion last week that we have to shut down operations immediately. I can tell you that the decision announced today, while not a surprise given the known challenges we were facing, was most difficult to take.

Since hearing in mid April of the Harper government's decision to deny us the two year transition funding we had requested, the staff has been working tirelessly to see if there was a chance we could pull through based on the six months of support received from Canadian Heritage. Early signs were positive beyond our expectations. The response to membership renewals was most encouraging: in just over three months, we collected half of our increased target ($100K) for the year. A number of new organizations joined, more than a dozen increased their contribution to reflect their budgets, and others indicated clearly that they were ready to contribute substantially more. We were developing a variety of strategies for a membership drive, like the one launched by the Edmonton Arts Council on our behalf. Through our Founders' Circle initiative, we had found sufficient funding to see us through to next March, and we were working on projects that created real interest.

But a sober assessment of our prospects for 2013-14 led us to the sad conclusion that despite our best efforts, we could not do in six months what we had told the government would take a minimum of two years to put in place. Time was not on our side to keep operations going as we tried to restructure, and we resolved that it would be irresponsible on our part to accept funding, private and public, under such circumstances.

As you will see in this summary, the CCA has played a crucial role over the past 67 years in the development of the Canadian cultural sector and of federal cultural policies. The CCA was and remains the largest alliance that brings the whole Canadian arts, culture and heritage sector together. It alone provides a national forum where issues of common interest can be discussed and pursued. This is why it must not disappear altogether.

Over the past several months, we have confirmed in a nation wide consultation and through the support of a large number of you that the need for this unique common instrument is greater now than ever. Many of you have told us over the past several months that if we did not have the CCA, we would have to invent it. In order to facilitate this to the full extent of our capacity, we are taking measures to put the organization in a state of suspension, putting in place a caretaker Board charged with preserving our incorporation and our charitable status. You will find in our National Director's blog more details about how we leave the organization. We look forward to the day when a new group of stakeholders picks up the torch to revive the CCA as a unique observer and independent voice for Canadian culture at the national level.

In closing, I want to express my gratitude to my colleagues on the Board for their generous commitment to the organization over the past years. And my warmest thanks to the staff of the CCA who, throughout what was a very difficult and challenging period, showed exceptional loyalty, dedication to the organization and quiet creativity in both approach and style.

We leave proud both of the efforts made and of the rich legacy of the CCA. Let us hope that this is just a temporary hiatus and that a new revitalized CCA will spring up from the seed we leave behind.

Kathleen Sharpe
Chair of the Board
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Message from the National Director

This morning the CCA issued a press release titled, The Canadian Conference of the Arts closes its doors after 67 years. I don't need to tell you how difficult it has been to write those words down and how we have tried our best not to express them. But there comes a moment when reality stares down the most hopeful outlook on things.

It is seven years to the day that I was given the job of National Director of the CCA. During these years I have developed the greatest of respect for this organization and the incredible contribution it has made to the development of cultural policies at the federal level. How many times, particularly over the past two years, have I heard people say that if we did not have the CCA, we would have to invent it? Over the last 18 months we have enthusiastically embraced the challenge set before us by the government's decision to put an end to 47 years of funding. We attempted to reinvent the organisation as an autonomous body, but as our Chair Kathleen Sharpe says in her letter, we would have needed two years of funding to transition to this new model, rather than the brief six months that we were given.

There were moments of great hesitation as to the merits of continuing our work, to go forward on the basis of commitments received to date and encouraging signs from our members, who confirmed that we were on the right track by renewing their memberships. Wouldn't the simple act of giving up kill the possibility of succeeding against all odds? But when we stepped back and considered our chances of continuing past March 2013, it became apparent to the Board as well as the secretariat that it would be irresponsible to risk the funds that had been collected from public and private supporters to date. We concluded that the best we could do in the circumstances would be to leave the organisation in order, in a suspended state, in the hopes that a group ready to take on the challenge of re launching this unparalleled instrument in the arts, culture and heritage sector would emerge.

We remain convinced the Canadian cultural sectors need an organisation like the CCA. We're talking about a role as convenor, observer, and analyst of the major cultural issues at the national level. In the changing environment we find ourselves in, the Canadian cultural sector needs to pull together, to come out of our solitude, to identify common interests, and to develop strategies to pursue them. The team that you know is withdrawing, but we are leaving you with what you need in order that you may pick up the torch, in new conditions, like the phoenix rising from the ashes.

Over the course of the next few weeks, we will take measures to make this transition possible and to preserve certain key projects like the annual federal budget analysis that the CCA has been publishing for more than 20 years. We are putting an agreement in place with the University of Ottawa so that our provincial and territorial budget analyses from the perspective of the arts, culture and heritage project, which we were aiming to publish in January, sees the light of day and, if possible, continues in the future. We will be moving our important documents to the National Archives, which already holds much of our history since 1945. We will put in place a board of governors that will become the guardians of the organisation's legacy.

We leave behind a glorious history, but also a promising future, as long as someone is willing and able to take up our work. It is this hope and desire for the sector that makes our departure less difficult. The cultural sector is one of creativity and invention: I have confidence that you will recreate a space that reflects you and brings you together in the future, a place that belongs to you completely, immune to the vagaries of politics, and over which you will be the proud champions.

To close, I salute you, and thank you all. This has been a great moment in my life, to work with you all, passionate, cultured people!

Alain Pineau
National Director
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