"The Links Between the Arts and Business are Key"

Isaac - I'm about to make a comment that so many, many readers of this blog will take issue with, but be unable to dispute.

Isaac, this city does it's best to fund stuff for small, minority (as in numbers) groups of people. Don't believe me? Well, here we are talking about the arts, out of our population (in Portland) of almost 3.5 million people wanna take a guess how many of them attended an opera last year? Or plan on attending one this year? How many have been to ANY kind of art exhibit last year or this year? I strongly doubt that the numbers would amount to 10%.

Light rail, a VERY expensive transportation alternative, less than 10% of our population uses it.

All the money going to the tram and the So-What district - what percent of our population will be using it? What percent will be using it on a regular basis and/or living down there?

We need roads, not trains. We need good, repaired roads, not streetcars. We need the funds to get more police on the streets, not let more criminals out early.

Portland continues to cry "We need more money" but when you look at what they spend it on ... 'nuff said.

Mmmarvel, you look pretty stupid now (and again), spouting out those bogus stats! Looks like Jesse has real numbers at his fingertips. Your stat for the City's population is WAYYY off, too. Of course now you'll tell us, "That's not the point." Mmmhmmm. Whatever you say, Mmmarvel.

And take a look at which organization sponsered the poll? Was there really a question as to what the results would show? Notice the questions, as they were actually presented were NOT given? The criteria by which a person was selected was not given. For example, if the person giving the poll asked, "Do you (or have you) attended a performing arts performance in the last year?" If the person answered no, were they told thank you and hung up on? We don't know.

Easy to skew a poll to help it show the results that you wanted, and when you sponser a poll, often you are looking for a certain results. Bottom line, I have a VERY hard time believing the results and would be VERY interested in seeing how it was conducted.

Actually I got the number for the city population from Google, you can too if you google it.

As for the 'stat' - please notice my verbage, I said I strongly doubted that much more than 10% - didn't say I had a stat, never claimed it to be a fact; so it wasn't bogus because I didn't present it as a fact.

You need to take a course in arguing from logic; and thanks for reading.

As I stated above, I'd be real curious about what the actual questions were and what criteria the respondents had to answer to be considered/included.

But that aside, like Steve said, my only objection is that tax money is spent on it. You want to support it via payroll deduction, it's your money go ahead. You want to support it by buying a ticket or some work of art, go ahead. But why must taxpayer money be spent on it when so many other city needs go unmet.

The city will match up to $200,000 - and how many meals for the homeless would that provide? How many beds for the homeless might that provide? How many more cops could we put on the streets for that money? How many pot holes could be filled?

THAT has been and continues to be my gripe.

See, things bother me, like this poll. Arts and culture, what exactly did the encompass? Was going to a concert considered part of it? Did going to a country western (or Goth) concert count and if so did it count as much as opera or was any distinction? Did going to the movies count? Or was it strictly going to art galleries? Going dancing at a nightclub, was that part of what counted? Or was that ruled out and only watching the ballet counted?

Questions, we have questions and the 'answers' provided on the page you linked us to were far from definitive.

Mmmarvel, the poll was conducted scientifically by Riley Research Associates, and because we wanted a very real assesment of the public's attitudes, we deliberately removed bias from the survey questions. If you'd like to contact me directly I'd be happy to answer whatever questions you have about the survey questions, responses, and methodology. jhawthorne@racc.org.

I hardly count 2% of one's budget heavy subsidy. I call it hardly anything.