Seattle and Raleigh-Durham marketing, graphic and brand design studio Design Kompany

That’s the question a panel of government folks and community arts advocates started to tackle earlier this evening.

Tonight’s meeting called out the problem of rising real estate prices that are forcing out lower income residents from Capitol Hill.

Like artists.

It was partly sponsored by a subgroup of 4Culture, partly by Capitol Hill Arts Center, and partly by the Capitol Hill Chamber of Commerce.

Here’s what came out of the discussion…

Big points that came out of the panel’s talk:

• Artists need to think like businesspeople, by learning to seek funding to keep themselves going, said Susan Shannon, who just moved here from Michigan to direct the Mayor’s Office of Economic Development.
• Government is there to listen, but government officials need to know what the people in the arts community want and need, said Seattle City Councilmember Nick Licata.
• If Capitol Hill is to maintain its positioning as an “arts community,” it really needs to acquire a dedicated space for arts programs. That means buying a building, said Shannon.
• Artists have to learn to understand developers and politics, said Charlie Rathbun of 4Culture. These are the people who can help them. “Developers want interesting amenities like performing arts.”
• Arts people who are really good at programming and grantwriting shouldn’t have to worry about all the details of running a facility. “Our ‘art’ is making space for people,” said Randy Engstrom of the West Seattle-based Youngstown Arts Center. This project, which Randy told me took about two years to get off the ground, sounds like one working example of how people can team up to make the best of limited resources.
• Partnerships need to happen. If you have common goals, can share resources and work together, you’re more likely to find funding to keep your different organizations going.

What other people who happened to be there said

Aside from Design Kompany, 98 other people turned up to listen in.

Some asked questions about zoning.

Some wanted to know what incentives the government officials could draw up to attract artists to Capitol Hill. Programs like this exist in places like Minneapolis, for example.

Some just wanted to tell the stories of how what they tried a long time ago was met with brick walls (unsympathetic government people, unreturned calls, bulldozed ideas). It was painful to hear an older gentlemen, “Dan,” speak so bitterly about how he had to fight tooth and nail against government officials to save the history of Pike Place Market and Pioneer Square decades ago.

Another audience member told us he moved here after getting squeezed out from a Soho loft in New York. “Art is about self-expression,” he said. “Seattle is an incubator city.” This is where artists find their voice, make their brand known, and then go to bigger cities like New York and San Francisco to sell.

Some people didn’t seem to take kindly to this, but the sentiment hung in the air for a while: Howcome Seattle isn’t New York?

[Well, first off, we don’t have a subway.]