NASAA News and Current Information

Doubly Good This Year-End

Don’t miss the special chance to turn $25,000 into $50,000! Now through December 31 your gift will be matched dollar for dollar, going even further to ensure state arts agencies get the advocacy and support they need in 2021. Looking ahead, NASAA is giving strong voice to the value of the arts in troubled times—state arts agencies are key to sustaining a vital creative sector and to fostering resilience, recovery and healing. Join us in this work and double the value of your gift now. No gift is too small and every gift matters. Thank you!

Maine’s Julie Richard Steps Down

Maine Arts Commission Executive Director Julie Richard steps down this month to accept the position of executive director of the Sedona Arts Center in Sedona, Arizona. In her eight years with the Commission, Richard helped foster a stronger and more vibrant arts and culture sector throughout the state, from the completion of the first comprehensive statewide cultural plan in 2015 to reforming the agency’s grants program to be more transparent and equitable, to the creation of ArtsEngageME, the statewide cultural network for arts advocacy. In 2016, Richard oversaw the state’s second Arts Education Census, which produced a comprehensive assessment of arts programming in Maine schools. The Commission has seen more than a $100,000 increase through its Partnership Grant with the National Endowment for the Arts during Richard’s tenure. Within a typical fiscal year, the Arts Commission processes about 450 grant applications across multiple programs and artistic disciplines. In 2020, while enduring the difficult times of the COVID-19 pandemic, Richard’s staff reviewed and processed 1,421 successful grants and provided much needed emergency relief to constituents with additional funding from the Arts Endowment and the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act. Under Richard’s leadership, the Maine Arts Commission also expanded its services, offering more professional development opportunities, workshops and intensives for creative workers and their communities throughout the year. It is expected that an interim director will be named in the coming weeks.