This week when Gilroy Arts and Culture Commission member, Arline
Silva, went to the San Jose Museum of Art to meet California First
Lady Sharon Davis, you can bet she put the buzz in her ear about
Gilroy and the Commission’s future plans for our city, including
the upcoming Arts Conference in May.
This week when Gilroy Arts and Culture Commission member, Arline Silva, went to the San Jose Museum of Art to meet California First Lady Sharon Davis, you can bet she put the buzz in her ear about Gilroy and the Commission’s future plans for our city, including the upcoming Arts Conference in May. Every other sentence was “Gilroy this” and “Gilroy that.” “Will you ever be coming to Gilroy?” she asked as Mrs. Davis signed her new book, Capitol Kitty. The First Lady created the book to help young people get a sense of who works in the Capitol, as well as provide lessons about friendship, truthfulness, and courage. All proceeds from Capitol Kitty benefit California school libraries. The personable Mrs. Davis took an interest in our new community-oriented bookstore when she heard about it and asked Arline to spell the name out for her. Maybe, we’ll see her in Gilroy one of these days.
It surprised me to learn that the arts industry directly employs more people nationally than the legal, medical, accounting, construction, farming, and fishing industries. Artists are also employers of other people: artists spend money on supplies, materials equipment, machinery, services, travel, education, wardrobe and other work-related needs. In California, the arts provide 400,000 jobs. The economic activity associated with the arts generates 830 million in revenue for state government in the form of fees and taxes.
“Cats don’t belong to people. They belong to places.” (Wright Morris). When she moved into her office at the Capitol, Sharon Davis discovered a cute black kitty on her windowsill and learned that she survived by being fed and taken to the vet by people who work in the Capitol. She has made her home under the windowsill at the Capitol for the past ten years. Every morning and every evening she assumes her special spot near the entrance of the Capitol, “greeting all the employees like a queen reviewing her royal subjects.”
Will there be a sequel? Sharon Davis says, yes, she has begun a book that will take Capitol Kitty to the State Fair. The idea is that, like many people, Capitol Kitty lives as if the world around her (the beautiful Capitol grounds) is the whole world. When she travels to the Fair, she realizes there is so much more out there than she imagined.
Mrs. Davis is a great supporter of the arts, and when Arline asked her about the future of the arts in California, she was optimistic, “The budget problems force us to collaborate more in our support of the arts,” she answered, “and to use our resources more wisely.” Investment in the arts is good public policy and makes good business sense. Arts and Culture in California, as an industry, generates $16.75 billion in annual economic activity – $6.65 billion by arts organizations (as employers and consumers), and an additional $10.1 billion in event-related spending by arts audiences. Cultural facilities are centers of civic pride. The arts not only produce revenue but they encourage tourism; they draw both visitors and tourists, attract industry and skilled workers, enhance property values, and serve as an important component of downtown and neighborhood redevelopment. The arts encourage self-esteem, improve academic performance, support life-long learning, promote healing, fortify cognitive skills, reclaim at-risk youth, and help in treating Alzheimer’s. To read more about all of these benefits, visit www.cac.ca.gov/ (Web site for the California Arts Council). I hope we can all give our support to the arts in Gilroy, and, as Sharon Davis wrote in the front of the book she signed for me, “I hope you enjoy this Cat-Tale.”
