The Building

Crain's New York Business reports that local nonprofits are "scrambling" to get a piece of the federal stimulus funds that are scheduled to start pouring into the state, any minute now.

According to Senior Reporter Miriam Kreinin Soucca, the priority is money for construction projects that are "shovel ready." She mentions a few examples, such as one about a theater that is trying to get a new sidewalk out front and this about a worthy non-profit in Brooklyn that needs a new fence to go with their $25 million dollar multipurpose room:

Pamela Green, executive director of the Weeksville Heritage Center in Brooklyn, an African-American historical society, submitted a $5 million request to the New York Department of Cultural Affairs and to several of the city's elected officials

The city has already provided Weeksville with much of the $25 million it needs for a 19,000-square-foot performance and education space that the center plans to break ground on in June.

Stimulus money would enable Weeksville to add a parking lot and a fence, but Ms. Green is uncertain about her odds.

“We don't know who else is on the list, and we don't know who we are competing against,” she says. “And we also have no idea what the requirements were.”

Hypertextual:

OZYMANDIAS

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

-Percy Bysshe Shelley

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

Materials for the Arts (MFTA) has been serving New York City arts and cultural organizations since 1978. They are the original recyclers and if you don't know about them you should.

They give away free stuff and here's how it works: Materials are gathered from companies and individuals that no longer need them and Materials for the Arts redistributes the good stuff to the organizations, artists and educators who need it to run their programs.

Find out if you are eligible to receive free stuff from MFTA.

Find out how to become an MFTA donor.

Going to the MFTA warehouse always feels like an adventure and, in my experience, they always have exactly what you need and something you never knew you wanted.

For instance, I was just over on their website poking around and I discovered that they have an education program with a whole roster of teaching artists and cool workshops and everything.

Who knew?

Good Times or Bum Times?

Do you ever read Crains NY? For some reason, I do. In good times, it's like a who's who of fun and power. In not so good times, it's like a horror movie featuring wolves at the door and harbingers of doom.

But then there's this. A silver lining or a bright shining lie?

Someone says that cultural institutions are still building things and that construction projects by groups like El Museo del Barrio and the Museum of the City of New York will have an estimated economic impact of $2.2 billion dollars and create 2,500 jobs per year from 2006 to 2010.

Do they mean construction jobs? They must mean construction jobs and I will never know because all of the details are contained in a report released by the Alliance for the Arts that I will never understand or even read properly. I skimmed it. It made no sense to me.

Non sequitur: Have you noticed that organic apples are down to $1.99/pound at Whole Paycheck? Is that deflation? Are things good or bad? Are we sinking or swimming? OMG. I forgot to take math, history and political science.

The report I mentioned, Culture Builds New York: The Economic Impact of Capital Construction at New York City's Cultural Institutions, is available here as a PDF.

Also: The Magic Theater is saved!

Also: The Zipper Theater is closed!

I can't go on, I must go on.

My sister, my daughter.

Finally: Eartha.