Arts & Culture Plan

The Ulster County Arts & Culture Plan marks a groundbreaking moment. This first-ever comprehensive plan will serve as a blueprint for defining, assessing, prioritizing, and charting a course for a flourishing arts and culture landscape in Ulster County.

This process, from 2024 into 2025, seeks to accomplish:

• Inventory Creative Resources: Develop an inventory of the creative resources now available across the County, including facility capacities and amenities, to highlight trends in the existing arts ecosystem that may be leveraged to support growth and sustainability.

• Quantify Economic Impact: Conduct a comprehensive Fiscal and Economic Impact Analysis to measure the arts sector's contribution to Ulster County's overall prosperity. This analysis will consider the economic benefits for our residents, businesses, and neighborhoods as well as the cultural economy’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

• Identify Strategies to Empower a Thriving Ecosystem: Define Ulster County's leading role in cultivating and sustaining a vibrant local arts scene to enable its celebration and promotion of the voices of our residents, including enhanced communication between arts organizations and the communities they serve.

• Guide Investment in the Future: Develop a suite of possible policies and services that align with identified community needs to direct resources toward the greatest impacts. These will address programming opportunities and access for residents and visitors and include services for the creative community and its economy, as well as funding sources for cultural initiatives such as public art, performance and education programming, and capital improvements to arts and cultural facilities.

• Foreground Social Equity: Plan with intention to strengthen, leverage, and integrate resources to advance economic prosperity and ensure equitable access and benefits for ALL Ulster County residents, resulting in a truly inclusive cultural landscape that allows the whole community to participate in and enjoy Ulster County’s cultural offerings.

SIGN UP today to be part of this process! Outreach will include town hall meetings, creative sector workshops, surveys, and community conversations.

The County seeks input from as many community members as possible on how arts and culture can create a more equitable, thriving, and prosperous County. The final plan will reflect input from all ages and backgrounds, providing well-defined goals and strategies that align with broader community needs, including economic prosperity, social equity, environmental protection, and cultural vitality.

"Totally Dedicated: Leonard Contino 1940-2016" exhibition installation image, The Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art at SUNY New Paltz.

A 27-member Project Advisory Committee (PAC), featuring top arts leaders in Ulster County, will guide the plan. This committee represents a diverse range of geographies, artistic disciplines, genders, and races. Their expertise will help create a comprehensive and inclusive arts plan that is both aspirational and practical.

To spearhead this initiative, the County has engaged Lord Cultural Resources, a leading global arts and culture planning practice with a proven track record spanning over 40 years that helps arts and cultural destinations achieve their full potential. Work began in April 2024, with the goal of presenting the full plan to the Ulster County Legislature in March 2025. The project is managed by an Ulster County team including Peter Criswell, Chair of the Ulster County Legislature; Joshua Stratton-Rayner, Deputy Director of Economic Development; and Sara Pasti, Arts and Development Consultant and City of Kingston Ward 1 Alderwoman.

The Arts & Culture Master Plan will develop an inventory of creative resources across the County and gather and analyze data on the economic impact of the arts and creative industries. The plan will outline goals and strategies to address programming opportunities, access for residents and visitors, services for the creative community, cultural economic development, and facilities development and will explore funding for public art, performance and education programming, and capital improvements.

SIGN UP

"Cinderella" by the State Ballet Theatre of Ukraine at the Ulster Performing Arts Center, 2023. Photo by James Rice.

PROJECT ADVISORY COMMITTEE