The Creative Coalition to Host 'Davos of the Arts in the Desert' in Las Vegas

Yahoo

11-02-2025

Fifty C-suite executives, policymakers, actors, musicians, media personalities, senior entertainment executives and artists will come together on Feb. 12 and 13 in the Summerlin community of Las Vegas for The Creative Coalition's inaugural National Arts Advocacy Summit.
This invitation-only event will feature roundtables and panels, uniting leaders to advocate for the future of the arts by engaging in meaningful discussions toward developing strategies that highlight the arts' essential role in U.S. economic growth and workforce development. Takeaways from these conversations will comprise a policy roadmap for arts funding that TCC will present on Capitol Hill and to the White House in April.
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Participants include Paramount Global Senior VP Rob O'Neill, executive producer Jessica Sharzer (American Horror Story), actor and president of The Creative Coalition Tim Daly (Madam Secretary), Howard Hughes Holdings CEO David O'Reilly, LeVar Burton (Star Trek: The Next Generation), Harry Hamlin (80 for Brady), Amazon's head of communications strategy Sallie Schoneboom, actor Richard Kind (Only Murders in the Building), executive producer Bill Prady (Young Sheldon) and The Hollywood Reporter co-editor-in-chief Maer Rohan, among forty others. (THR is the official media partner of the Summit.) Panel topics will include 'State of the Arts: The View from the Nation's Capital,' 'Art Works and Family Caregiving Connection' and 'Business of Art.'
Robin Bronk, CEO of The Creative Coalition, describes the Summit as the 'Davos of the Arts in the desert.'
'The summit couldn't come at a more critical time,' Bronk says. 'This is an 18-hour real-time strategic planning session. We've brought together a colloquy of the best minds in the nation to focus on this. The business and industry leaders supporting The Creative Coalition are the organization's brain trust. We maximize and leverage their talents, connections and insights. The Creative Coalition has one goal, the same goal we've pursued for decades: To ensure that arts in communities and public education thrive and flourish in this nation.'
The idea for the summit arose after the coalition's annual #RightToBearArts day last April. 'We knew we were walking into an election year and needed different strategic plans to get legislation done,' Bronk says. 'Some things you have to do in person.'
The Creative Coalition began in 1989 when the Reagan administration announced it would heavily reduce and potentially eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts (a threat that is seemingly being repeated under the second Trump administration, as grants supporting underserved groups and communities were recently dropped).
'There was a group of young actors at the time, who were friends: Christopher Reeve, Susan Sarandon, Ron Silver and Alec Baldwin,' says Bronk. 'They took the train from New York to Capitol Hill and went on a congressional door-knocking campaign, and armed themselves with facts and figures to convince Congress not to eliminate the NEA but to keep public funding for the arts. Ever since then, the NEA has been treated like the dessert of the budget. It's an afterthought. It has never reached the funding levels it had in the mid-80s, despite entertainment being our biggest export. So since then, every year, The Creative Coalition goes back to Capitol Hill and we bring a delegation of leaders to talk about why the arts need support.'
About 10 years ago, Bronk says they realized they couldn't just have the entertainment industry and artists advocating for the arts, as every other sector and industry is positively affected by the arts. 'Now we bring industry leaders from every type of consumer product to every part of the industry, from finance to consumer goods, to come and advocate for the arts, because it affects their bottom line, their workforce,' she says. According to data compiled by the Coalition, the arts contribute $763.6 billion annually to the U.S. economy — more than agriculture, transportation or warehousing — and employ 4.9 million workers across the country, with earnings exceeding $370 billion. The arts also export $20 billion more than is imported, providing a positive trade balance for the United States.
The TCC trip to Capitol Hill hasn't changed much in 40 years. 'We meet with members of Congress from both sides of the aisle and the White House. We meet with supporters and with adversaries to try and educate them on why we want them to be a supporter. The budget of the NEA is about $189 million, which, in the grand scheme of things, is a drop in the bucket,' Bronk says. 'We have case studies: 'This community in New York was going bankrupt, got an NEA grant, started with a museum, became a big tourist area, and suddenly, it's an economically thriving community.' For every dollar spent on the arts in a community, nine dollars comes back.'
'We have a lot of allies on both sides of the aisle, but we are woefully underfunded,' says TCC president Daly. 'A country like England, a fifth of our size, has a budget of $1.4 billion; in Spain, which is even smaller, $1.6 billion. We're way behind in public funding. I'm prepared for a fight.'
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