10-07-2025
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
Oakland eliminates top arts position to save $300K. Critics say it's a mistake
Oakland has the drag splendour of Oaklash, the sprawling art party of Oakland First Fridays, the form-breaking plays of Oakland Theater Project, the wall dancers of Bandaloop, the hip-hop extravaganza of Hiero Day, the fire-wielding performers of the Crucible and various community arts groups celebrating a medley of races and cultures.
What it doesn't have is an arts leader in city government.
The Oakland City Council passed a budget on June 11 that eliminated its Cultural Affairs Manager position, citing budgetary concerns. But critics say money-saving justifications haven't been made in good faith.
Until autumn, Lex Leifheit will serve in the role in an interim capacity. Her predecessor, Roberto Bedoya, departed in October after seven years on the job. The fate of the department's four remaining staffers remains unclear.
'How can you have a city and not have an individual in charge of promoting its cultural assets?' Bedoya told the Chronicle, noting he had no indication of the city's plans when he retired at age 72. 'It burns me.'
Oakland has used various arts leadership structures over the past 30 years, a representative for the city administrator's office told the Chronicle, noting that Bedoya's role gave the arts the highest position in the city's hierarchy since 2003.
Oakland City Council Member Janani Ramachandran, the most senior member of the committee that revised the mayor's first draft of the budget, said the Cultural Affairs Manager position — which costs the city $300,000 annually in salary and benefits — was one of 300 open roles the council eliminated to close a $265 million budget deficit without laying off active employees.
While Ramachandran said she had nothing against Bedoya, she described the position as a 'figurehead.'
'We don't have the luxury of having some of these roles that are morale-boosting to some people but don't serve the needs of the everyday struggling, starving artists that are in my community,' she explained, noting her artistic endeavors. (She sings with her partner in the R&B duo Wish U Were Us, in addition to producing events such as Oakland's Finest: Hip Hop Meets Gospel and Oakland's Diwali celebration, as well as performing with Woodminster Summer Musicals and the Laurel StreetFair World Music Festival.)
But others revere Bedoya, including Archana Nagraj, executive director of Destiny Arts Center, a longtime Cultural Affairs Commission grantee. The notion that he was a mere figurehead is 'absolutely not true,' she contends, citing millions of dollars he raised for the city as well as the way he brought arts leaders together.
Raquel Iglesias, who left her staff position in the Cultural Affairs Commission in May, also sang her former boss' praises.
'When I tell people I'm from Oakland, they're like, 'Oh my God, I have (Bedoya's) cultural plan on my desk. I look at it all the time,'' she said, referring to her experiences attending national convening on behalf of the city. When she accompanied him to these events, she added, 'I feel like I'm a celebrity's assistant.'
Oakland reaped dividends from Bedoya's national renown, Iglesias continued, referring to outside money he brought to the city during his tenure: $7,775,000 from sources including the Mellon Foundation, the Surdna Foundation, the Bay Area Creative Corps, the National Endowment for the Arts and the CARES Act.
'Most private foundations do not want to give money directly to local municipalities,' Iglesias said, noting that Bedoya used his connections, expertise and creative problem solving to find pass-through intermediaries those foundations could accept. 'He had the relationships.'
Vanessa Whang, who chairs the volunteer segment of the Cultural Affairs Commission, explained that other benefits of the manager's work, while less direct, are nonetheless meaningful.
'Anything that is positive about Oakland (in the national media) is about its culture,' she said.
Ramachandran discounted those wins.
Whang and Iglesias, in a joint interview with the Chronicle, expressed worry that Ramachandran might harbor longstanding ill feeling against the Cultural Affairs Commission, possibly leading her to target its leader. They cited a February 2024 city council meeting in which Ramachandran said, 'I have many concerns about what appears to be gatekeeping to all our commissions and boards in this city and those that use their power to quiet certain voices,' going on to name the Cultural Affairs Commission specifically.
Ramachandran cited applicants to the advisory board whom she felt faced unnecessary barriers, including the DJ, consultant, entrepreneur and event and festival producer Ebodaghe Esoimeme, whose commission application was eventually accepted in March 2024 after an ethics review about his part-time employment with her.
In a separate interview with the Chronicle, Esoimeme confirmed his frustration with the process.
But Ramachandran firmly denied that her staffer's experience influenced her and fellow council members' decision to eliminate the cultural affairs position from the city budget.
'There's nothing personal,' she said, citing how the budget eliminates positions in sectors from the early childhood education program Head Start to efforts to combat homelessness. 'Everyone is mad at us for cutting something.'
She argued that the alternative — keeping positions and services now only to run out of money midyear and axe them suddenly — is 'not fair to anyone.' She also noted that the role's elimination isn't permanent; Oakland can always reinstate it if finances improve.
Whang, Iglesias and their allies are hoping they can persuade city leaders to amend the budget, possibly with funds from one of the areas that got an increase, to keep the Cultural Affairs Manager position. They hope to secure it before Leifheit, who most recently worked in San Francisco's Office of Economic & Workforce Development, departs in early November. (She told the Chronicle she's still considering her options for what's next but plans to stay local.)
Yglesias and Whang homed in on a $1.4 million budget allocation for sideshow prevention.
'When you talk about public safety, a lot of the time, you need productive things for young people to do to keep them from getting into nonsense,' Whang said, positing art as a wonderful alternative.
Nagraj, whose organization reaches 6,000 young people per year, agreed.
'If we are pitching fire stations versus the arts, that kind of an argument is really challenging,' she said. 'We need both.'
