May 6, 2025
Georgia, Montana, Vermont, Virginia: Strategic Plans from Small Agencies
State arts agencies develop strategic plans that articulate their missions and guide their work. Each plan is informed by public input gathered from stakeholders inside and outside of the arts sector, with special care taken to reach populations with limited access to the arts. This high degree of public engagement is a hallmark of state arts agency planning and helps agencies respond to community needs while also fulfilling the requirements for federal funding.
To say that every state arts agency plan is unique is an understatement! Each agency must respond to different community conditions. Goals, objectives and measurement approaches all vary, depending on the cultural history of the state as well as its current economic and operational realities. Planning also offers an opportunity to connect the work of the state arts agency with the broader goals of state government.
This month we’re featuring recent plans from four states with contrasting environments: Georgia, Montana, Vermont and Virginia. Each plan illustrates a different approach to gathering public input, communicating the value of the arts, working with planning partners, and organizing the work of a small agency with limited capacity.
Georgia
The Georgia Council for the Arts (GCA) engaged the Carl Vinson Institute of Government at the University of Georgia to facilitate its last planning process. The institute helped the arts council to harvest input not only from artists and arts organizations but also from local and state government officials, teachers, folk/traditional art practitioners and researchers, culturally specific communities, and arts patrons. The process included extensive consultation with the Georgia Department of Economic Development, within which GCA is housed. Three in-person town halls, two virtual town halls, an online survey and one-on-one interviews secured input from rural, midsized and urban constituents. GCA also used partnerships with organizations such as the Georgia Municipal Association, the Georgia Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, Georgia Lawyers for the Arts and multiple arts service organizations to encourage broad participation in the planning process. The institute helped GCA to synthesize input and hone its commitments into a 2023-2027 Strategic Plan, which identifies practical action steps the agency will take in the next five years.
Montana
The Montana Arts Council (MAC) devoted much of 2024 to assessing the current state of the creative sector in Montana and formulating a new plan. The agency needed a strategy for gathering public input across a large and primarily rural state of over 145,000 square miles. With NASAA’s help, MAC conducted a statewide survey that secured nearly 900 responses, including every Montana county and all seven Indian reservations. Respondents shared heartfelt responses—some celebrations, some challenges to do better and some pleas for help. Following the survey, MAC staff conducted a series of community visits across the state, speaking with community leaders, tribal groups, arts organizations, artists and other residents. These meetings helped to clarify the needs, challenges and dreams of the arts field and illuminated opportunities for the agency to grow the creative sector as an asset for Montana’s economy, schools and communities. The agency’s new Strategic Plan 2025-2030, developed by the agency staff and council without the use of outside consultants, identifies four areas of focus. The plan also outlines five guiding questions the agency will use to continually adapt its work and direct resources.
Vermont
The Vermont Arts Council‘s (VAC) new 2025-2030 Strategic plan celebrates the agency’s 60th anniversary. VAC is marking that moment by ratifying a plan to help artists thrive, to put creativity at the heart of Vermont communities and to facilitate access to the arts. The agency’s year-long planning process included eight in-person community engagement sessions, three virtual meetings and an online survey. Participants came from all Vermont counties and included artists, cultural organizations, grant applicants, educators, legislators, municipal leaders and private philanthropists. To ensure that no communities were excluded, VAC intentionally sought feedback from underserved groups. The agency engaged three consultants to support different aspects of planning. Two versions of the new plan were published: a summary version serves as a communications vehicle that relays the central thrust of the plan—The Arts Are for Everyone—along with topline agency actions; a full version includes a complete description of the planning process as well as detailed objectives and indicators of success, both quantitative and qualitative.
Virginia
As the Virginia Commission for the Arts (VCA) was preparing its latest plan, it gathered feedback from grantees, invited public input through agency newsletters and social media, and analyzed multiple years of grants data. The agency also maximized the use of technology to efficiently gather input. A local consulting firm helped VCA to facilitate an online community arts charrette. Padlet, a visual collaboration and brainstorming tool, was used to harvest ideas and synthesize stakeholders’ priorities. The agency views the resulting 2025-2028 Strategic Plan as the beginning, rather than the end, of a process of ongoing field consultation. Since ratifying the plan, the agency has convened local arts agencies to invite feedback and expects to conduct a statewide survey in the spring. To leverage its own planning process as a resource for constituents, VCA also worked with its charrette consultant to develop a new Strategic Planning Workbook—a resource to help small arts organizations embarking on or revising their own strategic plans. The workbook is a visual, action-oriented guide to planning best practices for community organizations primarily led by small staff teams or volunteers.
NASAA has collected additional examples of state arts agency strategic plans. For advice on your own state’s planning efforts, contact NASAA Executive Advisor Kelly Barsdate.