Artists Feel the Squeeze in a Midwest SoHo - New York Times
The New York Times
November 29, 2005
Artists Feel the Squeeze in a Midwest SoHo
By HOPE GLASSBERG
KANSAS CITY, Mo. - The creative resources in and around Topeka, Kan., in the 1980's didn't inspire a whole lot of confidence in Julie Tyler. So she promptly fled her hometown after high school for cities with more prominent art scenes, attending Boston's School of the Museum of Fine Arts, and eventually settling in Washington.
But a few years ago when Ms. Tyler, a printmaker and painter, and her husband, Victor, an amateur photographer, traveled back to nearby Kansas City, Mo., they were startled at the plethora of galleries and the number of artists living in the city's artsy Crossroads district. In many ways, they found the art scene more pulsating with life than its more famous outposts in the East.
"I always thought Kansas City didn't have its arts at the same level as the East Coast," said Ms. Tyler, 38. "But when I came back I saw stuff here that was as good as the art I saw in New York and D.C. There was just a good energy. People were actually like 'Oh great, a new artist,' not closed off and competitive."
In June the Tylers purchased a 2,900-square-foot loft without plumbing or kitchen appliances at 18th and Wyandotte Streets, in the heart of the Crossroads, for $500,000. That made them representative of a new type of person moving downtown: artsy, but also older, upwardly mobile and willing to put down half a million dollars for a bare-bones loft.
It's a process familiar to anyone who has watched the evolution of SoHo in New York or most other downtown revitalizations. However positive the impact on the Kansas City art scene - attracting new galleries and people like the Tylers away from the East Coast - urban renewal has also threatened to squeeze out the artists who pioneered its progress.
"There's a higher price point now, and things are shifting from a renter's market to an ownership market," said Bill Dietrich, chief executive of the Downtown Council, an organization that represents businesses, nonprofit organizations and property owners in Kansas City. A study commissioned by the council found that, demographically, the Crossroads district had changed more in the last few years than any other part of downtown. Median income rose to $79,000 in 2004 from $33,000 in 2002, while the average age of residents jumped to 33 from 24. Real estate prices - and, as a result, property taxes - have also risen substantially.
For young artists like Nancy Bach and Burak Duvenci, both 23, the pricey real estate in the Crossroads was not a realistic option. Instead they chose to rent a warehouse loft in the West Bottoms district, about two miles northwest of the Crossroads district. The space, which they share with two other artists, is 3,500 square feet and costs $275 a month per person. Indeed, the area - once home to light industrial manufacturing plants - positively teems with artists; locals say there are five or so warehouses with 50 to 100 residents each, sometimes squatting five to a loft.
The price is right, but the sustainability of the West Bottoms district as an artist's haven is suspect. Many of the buildings are not zoned for residential purposes, and the artists remain because the city has chosen to turn a blind eye, for now. Perhaps of greater concern to the arts community is that the growing West Bottoms settlements show how quickly downtown revitalization, in the Crossroads in particular, is driving young artists out.
"It's kind of a house of cards," said James Woodfill, a well-established local sculptor and installation artist who has a studio in the east Crossroads. "The Crossroads has based itself on young artists who live on shoestring budgets, but as rents and taxes rise, will that creative synergy move?"
If local artists, with the assistance of the city, have anything to say about it, the synergy will not be disrupted anytime soon. Tax abatements and private initiatives, leaders hope, will help the established arts community stay put and keep younger artists moving in.
Over the last year, the Crossroads Community Association has been working with the office of Mayor Kay Barnes to draw up a plan that would enable property owners using buildings for creative purposes like studios, fine arts schools or art dealerships to get a tax break. If the plan is passed by the City Council, building owners would pay property taxes based on the original value of their property for 10 years and then 50 percent of the tax value based on the most recent assessment of the property for the next 15.
Those same tax benefits were originally given on a project-by-project basis to real estate and commercial developers via Kansas City's Planned Industrial Expansion Authority to jumpstart growth downtown. Now that redevelopment is well under way - since 2000, the city and the private sector have invested more than $3 billion in downtown projects, and there are more than 3,000 residential units built, under construction or planned, according to the Downtown Council - artists want the same tax break to hedge against the rising property values that revitalization necessarily causes.
"It's good to get the neighborhood going, but why do you keep giving tax abatements to new people coming in?" said Stephanie Leedy, who manages several properties in the Crossroads district originally bought by her father, Jim Leedy, a local gallerist and artist. At one of her properties, the Leedy-Voulkos Art Center, property taxes more than tripled, to $40,000, two years ago.
Suzie Aron, president of the Crossroads Community Association, is confident that the plan will enable both established property owners to keep their taxes at bay and give newer residential developers an explicit reason to cater to artists. "The great thing about this plan is that if you are a landlord who rents to artists, you could qualify for the tax break and your renters will reap the benefits," she said.
For the tax abatement plan to pass, the entire Crossroads district would need to be deemed a "blighted" area. Forty percent of the district has already received that designation based on previous studies, and the city will survey the rest of the district starting next month, said Donovan Mouton, director of urban affairs in the mayor's office. Then, a majority of the 13-member City Council will also have to approve the plan.
In the meantime, initiatives like the Arts Incubator of Kansas City on 18th Street, a nonprofit that provides extensive business training and affordable studio space to nearly 40 artists, continue to keep young artists plugged in. Another prominent draw is the Urban Culture project, begun in 2003, which provides free studio and exhibition spaces to artists in vacant downtown storefronts. It is part of a larger organization known as the Charlotte Street Foundation, which offers unrestricted grants to Kansas City artists.
Milton Stevenson, a sculptor who graduated from the Kansas City Art Institute in 2004, is originally from New York and had intended to return upon graduation, but changed his mind when he considered the opportunities here. He rents a loft north of the River Market area and keeps studio space, courtesy of the Urban Culture Project, at 11th Street and Baltimore Avenue.
"There are a lot of things that encourage young artists to stay here," said Mr. Stevenson, 24. "I don't know of any other city where I could have had a show one year out of school and have another one planned."
* Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company
Link to Article Source
November 29, 2005
Artists Feel the Squeeze in a Midwest SoHo
By HOPE GLASSBERG
KANSAS CITY, Mo. - The creative resources in and around Topeka, Kan., in the 1980's didn't inspire a whole lot of confidence in Julie Tyler. So she promptly fled her hometown after high school for cities with more prominent art scenes, attending Boston's School of the Museum of Fine Arts, and eventually settling in Washington.
But a few years ago when Ms. Tyler, a printmaker and painter, and her husband, Victor, an amateur photographer, traveled back to nearby Kansas City, Mo., they were startled at the plethora of galleries and the number of artists living in the city's artsy Crossroads district. In many ways, they found the art scene more pulsating with life than its more famous outposts in the East.
"I always thought Kansas City didn't have its arts at the same level as the East Coast," said Ms. Tyler, 38. "But when I came back I saw stuff here that was as good as the art I saw in New York and D.C. There was just a good energy. People were actually like 'Oh great, a new artist,' not closed off and competitive."
In June the Tylers purchased a 2,900-square-foot loft without plumbing or kitchen appliances at 18th and Wyandotte Streets, in the heart of the Crossroads, for $500,000. That made them representative of a new type of person moving downtown: artsy, but also older, upwardly mobile and willing to put down half a million dollars for a bare-bones loft.
It's a process familiar to anyone who has watched the evolution of SoHo in New York or most other downtown revitalizations. However positive the impact on the Kansas City art scene - attracting new galleries and people like the Tylers away from the East Coast - urban renewal has also threatened to squeeze out the artists who pioneered its progress.
"There's a higher price point now, and things are shifting from a renter's market to an ownership market," said Bill Dietrich, chief executive of the Downtown Council, an organization that represents businesses, nonprofit organizations and property owners in Kansas City. A study commissioned by the council found that, demographically, the Crossroads district had changed more in the last few years than any other part of downtown. Median income rose to $79,000 in 2004 from $33,000 in 2002, while the average age of residents jumped to 33 from 24. Real estate prices - and, as a result, property taxes - have also risen substantially.
For young artists like Nancy Bach and Burak Duvenci, both 23, the pricey real estate in the Crossroads was not a realistic option. Instead they chose to rent a warehouse loft in the West Bottoms district, about two miles northwest of the Crossroads district. The space, which they share with two other artists, is 3,500 square feet and costs $275 a month per person. Indeed, the area - once home to light industrial manufacturing plants - positively teems with artists; locals say there are five or so warehouses with 50 to 100 residents each, sometimes squatting five to a loft.
The price is right, but the sustainability of the West Bottoms district as an artist's haven is suspect. Many of the buildings are not zoned for residential purposes, and the artists remain because the city has chosen to turn a blind eye, for now. Perhaps of greater concern to the arts community is that the growing West Bottoms settlements show how quickly downtown revitalization, in the Crossroads in particular, is driving young artists out.
"It's kind of a house of cards," said James Woodfill, a well-established local sculptor and installation artist who has a studio in the east Crossroads. "The Crossroads has based itself on young artists who live on shoestring budgets, but as rents and taxes rise, will that creative synergy move?"
If local artists, with the assistance of the city, have anything to say about it, the synergy will not be disrupted anytime soon. Tax abatements and private initiatives, leaders hope, will help the established arts community stay put and keep younger artists moving in.
Over the last year, the Crossroads Community Association has been working with the office of Mayor Kay Barnes to draw up a plan that would enable property owners using buildings for creative purposes like studios, fine arts schools or art dealerships to get a tax break. If the plan is passed by the City Council, building owners would pay property taxes based on the original value of their property for 10 years and then 50 percent of the tax value based on the most recent assessment of the property for the next 15.
Those same tax benefits were originally given on a project-by-project basis to real estate and commercial developers via Kansas City's Planned Industrial Expansion Authority to jumpstart growth downtown. Now that redevelopment is well under way - since 2000, the city and the private sector have invested more than $3 billion in downtown projects, and there are more than 3,000 residential units built, under construction or planned, according to the Downtown Council - artists want the same tax break to hedge against the rising property values that revitalization necessarily causes.
"It's good to get the neighborhood going, but why do you keep giving tax abatements to new people coming in?" said Stephanie Leedy, who manages several properties in the Crossroads district originally bought by her father, Jim Leedy, a local gallerist and artist. At one of her properties, the Leedy-Voulkos Art Center, property taxes more than tripled, to $40,000, two years ago.
Suzie Aron, president of the Crossroads Community Association, is confident that the plan will enable both established property owners to keep their taxes at bay and give newer residential developers an explicit reason to cater to artists. "The great thing about this plan is that if you are a landlord who rents to artists, you could qualify for the tax break and your renters will reap the benefits," she said.
For the tax abatement plan to pass, the entire Crossroads district would need to be deemed a "blighted" area. Forty percent of the district has already received that designation based on previous studies, and the city will survey the rest of the district starting next month, said Donovan Mouton, director of urban affairs in the mayor's office. Then, a majority of the 13-member City Council will also have to approve the plan.
In the meantime, initiatives like the Arts Incubator of Kansas City on 18th Street, a nonprofit that provides extensive business training and affordable studio space to nearly 40 artists, continue to keep young artists plugged in. Another prominent draw is the Urban Culture project, begun in 2003, which provides free studio and exhibition spaces to artists in vacant downtown storefronts. It is part of a larger organization known as the Charlotte Street Foundation, which offers unrestricted grants to Kansas City artists.
Milton Stevenson, a sculptor who graduated from the Kansas City Art Institute in 2004, is originally from New York and had intended to return upon graduation, but changed his mind when he considered the opportunities here. He rents a loft north of the River Market area and keeps studio space, courtesy of the Urban Culture Project, at 11th Street and Baltimore Avenue.
"There are a lot of things that encourage young artists to stay here," said Mr. Stevenson, 24. "I don't know of any other city where I could have had a show one year out of school and have another one planned."
* Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company
Link to Article Source
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