EQUITY STATEMENT

 

Accelerating Cultural Equity

Throughout Marin’s Creative Sector

 

Marin is a starkly segregated County with the deepest racial disparities in the State across a wide range of measures. In Marin’s 2019 Cultural Plan, our community made cultural equity—arts by and for everyone—one of three top-priority goals and tasked Marin Cultural Association (MCA) with spearheading its achievement. We are proud to bear that mantle and are committed to the necessary work, both in our organization and in partnership with the whole creative sector, to build a diverse, equitable and inclusive environment.

 

Our Vision for Cultural Equity at MCA & Throughout Marin: 

• Equitable Representation of Systemically Excluded Groups—On the staffs, boards, audiences, artists and in artistic programming;

• Equitable Access to Capital for BIPOC & Other Underrepresented Groups—Through individual donors and institutional mechanisms to support diverse artists and cultural expression;

• Welcoming Pathways to Arts Leadership for All—With education, training, mentorships and other support for systemically excluded groups;

• Equitable Access to High-Quality Arts—For every student in Marin County’s public schools.

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 Our Immediate Action Plan: 

• Shared Learning & Leadership—MCA will provide expert-facilitated training for County arts leaders, including MCA board members and staff in order to:

  • Center equity in their organizations and decision-making;  and

  • Develop a shared vision and collective strategy to advocate and advance cultural equity throughout the County.

• Ongoing Accountability—We will develop and employ ongoing equity metrics to hold ourselves accountable.

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PLEASE JOIN US!

 

From the Marin Cultural Equity Network

 

Marin County bears the painful distinction of being the most racially inequitable County in California. This is reflected across Marin’s creative sector as it is in all aspects of our civil life. That is why, in 2019, our community made cultural equity a central goal of the Marin Cultural Plan: “Ensure that Marin arts are by and for everyone.” We call on every member of Marin’s creative community to commit with us to the deep and serious work necessary to achieve this vision.

 

As members of Marin County’s arts and culture sector—artists, arts leaders and supporters who live or work in Marin—we acknowledge our own complicity in the systems and practices that have placed cultural access and participation out of reach for many in our community. We have formed the Marin Cultural Equity Network to

harness the collective power and creative capacity of Marin’s creative sector in the fight for cultural equity. We are committed to moving from words to action, to accomplishing transformative change, and to holding ourselves and one another accountable. The following Cultural Equity Pact is a first step in that journey. 

 

Please join us.

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