Boulder’s creative community is mobilizing to reclaim funding intended to support local artists and cultural organizations. Despite overwhelming public approval of Ballot Issue 2A in 2023 — designed to repurpose an expiring sales tax to generate $3.6 million annually for arts and culture — the City of Boulder’s 2025 budget has allocated a significant portion of these funds to administrative costs rather than direct arts funding.
On February 22, a group of artists and arts advocates launched a petition to restore the full 2A arts fund as originally intended. Within its first week, the petition gathered over 1,500 signatures and raised $4,800 via Change.org to aid in its distribution. Supporters argue that the city’s budget (which designates only 51 percent of the 2A funds for direct arts support while diverting 41 percent to salaries, consultants, and reserves) undermines the purpose of the ballot measure.
Boulder’s arts scene is a cornerstone of its identity, boasting the third-highest concentration of professional artists per capita in the U.S. However, arts funding remains a challenge, even as Boulder is considered a potential new home for the Sundance Film Festival, in 2027. Advocates argue that strong financial backing for local artists would enhance Boulder’s reputation as a cultural hub while sustaining existing institutions.
Among the most vocal supporters of the petition is Mark Ragan, managing director of the Boulder Ensemble Theatre Company (BETC), who has taken to Instagram and YouTube to urge residents to demand that city officials honor the original intent of the 2A funds. “The city basically allocated 41 percent of that $3.6 million that voters approved to administrative overhead, staffing, budget set-asides, future reserves,” Ragan said. “That’s what got everybody very upset in the arts community.”
Ragan further pointed out what he sees as a misuse of funds. “The Arts Commission and the people that were administering the arts in Boulder used to be paid out of the general fund,” he said. “When we won the ballot initiative, the spirit of the agreement was, well, this is new money. This is new money that's gonna go to arts organizations. But what the city did was take some of that money and use it to replace the money that was taken out of the general fund.”
Nick Forster, founder of live music venue eTown, echoed this sentiment, emphasizing that arts funding should be seen as an investment rather than an expense. “Study after study shows that the creative economy is an investment, not an expense,” Forster said. “By investing in the arts, there's a return on investment that comes in the form of sales tax through restaurants, hotels, shopping, and tourism. A vibrant creative economy isn’t a dead end — it actually generates revenue.”
Forster said Boulder’s approach to the 2A funds contrasts with how the state of Colorado is handling its bid to attract the Sundance Film Festival. “The state has authorized millions to bring Sundance here because they expect a return on investment,” he said. “Yet the city of Boulder still looks at the arts as an expense, not an investment. Our goal is to shift that thinking.”
Critics of the city’s budget decision argue that officials have effectively replaced previous arts funding with 2A dollars rather than supplementing it, reducing overall support for the arts. “Before 2A, the city allocated about $1.8 million to the arts from the general fund,” Forster said. “About half of that went to grants, and the other half covered internal costs. When 2A passed, they deleted that line item and shifted the burden onto these new dedicated sales tax funds. Instead of increasing arts support, they just reallocated existing expenses.”
Additionally, Forster highlighted a broader issue of transparency within the city’s budgeting process, noting that funds from other tax initiatives, such as the Community Culture Resilience and Safety (CCRS) tax, have also seen diminishing allocations to the arts over time. “Each time it got renewed, the arts got less and less,” he said. “Last year, the arts received only $58,000 from a fund allocating millions to capital projects.”
Petition organizers are urging residents to contact city council members and attend upcoming meetings to demand accountability. They argue that fully restoring 2A funds to arts grants and programming would not only align with voter intent but also help sustain Boulder’s struggling arts organizations, many of which have yet to recover financially from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Advocates are calling for the city to restore approximately $900,000 to the arts budget, representing half of the previous funding that included both grants and internal costs. “This is an easy decision,” Forster said. “City leaders can either build another layer of trust with the community or continue diverting funds away from the creative sector. We hope they make the right choice.”
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