Commissioner Vij details CDF and CIG funding increases and access programs

Thanks to the budget increases for DCLA following the release of the plan, we were also able to increase funding across the CDF and target the smaller CIGs for increased operating subsidies.

The FY26 CDF distributed $74.3 million to 1,171 cultural groups.

The year the plan was released, the CDF provided just over $40 million to 950 groups.

Last year, the agency also added five members to the cultural institutions group in each of the five boroughs, the largest such expansion since the 1970s.

This objective also committed to increase funding for individual artists.

While the strategies named included grant programs under the Mayor's Office of Media and Entertainment and our own re-grant partnerships with the Borough Arts Council, this is an area of the plan that lacked much substance and consequently has lacked much impact.

It is a priority for me as Commissioner.

Another strategy was exploring more flexible and multi-year support.

Starting in FY23, the agency did expand multi-year support to all eligible CDF grantees.

This year, 602 CDF groups were in a multi-year cycle, more than half of the grantee pool.

We also created new ways to educate potential grantees on the process, including a virtual application seminar.

Our recently released racial equity plan takes these strategies further with the goal of giving people back their time.

In it, we commit to conducting a review of all application and reporting requirements to simplify processes.

We also commit to significantly expanding the ways we conduct outreach, something you rightly pushed for during our budget hearings earlier this year, Deputy Speaker Williams.

Finally, this objective outlines strategies to improve cultural access for historically marginalized groups of artists, audiences, and cultural workers.

For this, the agency launched the Create NYC Disability Forward Fund and Language Access Fund.

Together, these programs have provided more than 700 grants totaling over $7 million to organizations serving these communities.

It also calls out our partnership with the council to administer initiatives like the Cultural Immigrant Initiative and Coalition of Theaters of Color and the launch of Library's Culture Pass program.

To date, Culture Pass has provided more than 568,000 free reservations to cultural institutions for New Yorkers.

Another program called out in the plan, IDNYC, has provided 806,000 free cultural memberships.