The Art of Managing Creative Canadian Communities (2009) project is the second phase of the Intermunicipal Comparative Framework and is a means to inventory and understand the infrastructure, scope, and nature of local government involvement and investment in cultural development across Canada. The project organizes and recognizes the value of this involvement, and facilitates intermunicipal comparisons: our goal is to collect and compile information from communities to demonstrate how local governments across Canada are handling arts, culture and heritage. 

This project has been developed as a resource for municipal staff who are interested in seeing what other communities are doing. It provides a snapshot of the current state of cultural development in Canadian communities. How arts and culture are managed at the municipal level, the structure of the management, what initiatives and support mechanisms they have put in place, and how they are implemented.   

The terms cultural development and culture are used throughout the project in an inclusive sense, and topics addressed in the surveys include arts, heritage, facilities, civic art collections, public art, funding, non-monetary support, and much more. 

Municipal support for culture is multifaceted. Our current focus includes: 

• Public Art - A survey on municipal public art policies, plans, and programs and an inventory of public art installations in place and in development. Document (PDF, 264 KB)
  
  
• Cultural Facilities - An inventory of civic owned and/or operated cultural facilities whose primary use is for the creation or exhibition of artistic activities (including but not limited to theatres, recital halls, rehearsal spaces, warehouse spaces dedicated to arts programming, amphitheatres, art galleries, art studios. It does not include museums and/or archives, live/work spaces, general parkland or fairgrounds, public art, private or not for profit owned cultural facilities, or community centres unless artistic programming and artistic activities are the primary user). Document (Excel, 72 KB)
  
  
• Cultural Services - A survey and inventory of municipal cultural plans/policies, as well as the structure and management of municipal cultural services. Document (PDF, 549 KB)