The proposed cuts to the city of San Diego’s arts and culture funding would have a direct and significant impact on my ballet company’s ability to serve the community at its current scale. City support helps sustain not only our performances, but also the education, outreach and community-centered programs that allow us to make contemporary dance accessible beyond traditional theater spaces.
For The Rosin Box Project in Point Loma, this funding supports artist employment, subsidized and free public programming, arts education initiatives in schools and opportunities for audiences who may not otherwise engage with live performances.
Programs like Ballet Machine, our arts-integrated literacy workshop for elementary students, Out of the Box community performances in public spaces, and Dance Break wellness initiatives rely on a funding structure that combines earned revenue with public investment. Without public support, programs designed specifically to remove barriers to arts access become increasingly difficult to maintain.
The impact would extend far beyond our organization. Our work activates local venues, supports working artists and arts professionals, attracts audiences to neighborhoods and businesses, and contributes to San Diego’s cultural identity as a creative and forward-thinking city.
As a contemporary ballet company, we are also creating and commissioning new artistic work at a significant scale for the region. Since our founding, The Rosin Box Project has commissioned and produced more than 59 new works while providing paid opportunities for dancers, choreographers, filmmakers, designers, educators and production staff. Cuts of the proposed magnitude threaten not only operational stability, but the larger creative ecosystem that allows local artists to build sustainable careers in San Diego rather than leaving for larger arts markets.
Most importantly, these cuts disproportionately impact the communities and audiences that public arts funding is meant to serve. When organizations lose operational support, the first programs placed at risk are often free community initiatives, educational outreach, low-cost ticket access, and programming in underserved neighborhoods. The result is that arts experiences become less accessible, less equitable and less embedded in the daily life of the city.
The Rosin Box Project will continue adapting and seeking alternative funding sources wherever possible, but there is no direct replacement for the scale and consistency of public arts investment. Organizations across the region are now being forced into the same limited pool of private foundation funding, corporate sponsorships and individual donations.
We are actively working to diversify revenue streams through increased individual giving campaigns, expanded corporate partnerships, special events, ticket revenue growth and institutional grants. However, replacing lost public funding entirely through private philanthropy is extraordinarily difficult, particularly for smaller grassroots organizations like ours that are still in the process of building long-term financial infrastructure.
Unlike larger legacy institutions with decades to accumulate reserves and endowments, emerging organizations often operate with far less margin, making sudden funding losses especially destabilizing.
Without public investment, The Rosin Box Project and other organizations like us will be forced to make difficult decisions threatening our long-term sustainability and growth. It will create instability at a moment when many arts organizations are still recovering from the lasting economic effects of the pandemic, inflation and reductions in federal arts support.
More broadly, the concern is not only about individual organizations surviving. It is about what kind of city San Diego wants to be. A thriving arts ecosystem contributes to civic identity, community connection, economic vitality and quality of life. When arts funding disappears, the loss is felt not just on stages and in galleries, but across neighborhoods, schools, small businesses and the broader cultural fabric of the city.
Arts and culture are infrastructure. Arts and culture are public safety. Arts and culture are economic development, education, mental health, tourism and community connection.
Carly Topazio is the founder, artistic director and CEO of The Rosin Box Project, San Diego’s premier contemporary ballet company.
