$1.17M Arts Program Would Help Performers Pay Downtown Rent

At the same time as Hood opens her campaign to boost the arts, the University of Central Florida Foundation has named Centex Rooney Construction Co. as construction manager for the planned 350,000-sf, estimated $200 million Downtown Florida Center for the Arts and Education. A ground-breaking date hasn't been set.

Hood wants her elected associates to support her nine-month Arts for All Seasons pilot program that calls for $500,000 being spent for operations and the same amount in capital funds. The program already has banked an additional $233,500 raised through an auction.

Brenda Robinson, Orlando's executive director of arts and cultural affairs, who draws a six-figure annual salary, will direct the city's new arts development drive, according to city hall staffers.

This newest campaign to boost the city's cultural image follows a disappointing blow in January when the Orange County commission announced it would not be able to allocate $3 million to the area's arts activities as previously planned.

The county's tourism tax was hit hard by 9-11 and the recession. Instead of $100 million-plus in annual hotel bed taxes, the county expects a 16% drop in 2001 tax collections from annual average amounts of about $90 million, according to county chairman Rich Crotty.

Hood's push for the arts will be backed by city commissioners who see the initiative as a plus for attracting national corporations to the area, either as office and industrial tenants or as property owners, area brokers tell GlobeSt.com.

"You won't find it written in any relocation manual of a Fortune 500 company, but quite often the final decision on where a company will open a branch, a new division or move the entire headquarters hinges on what the company's chief executive likes to do or not do, like golfing, going to the opera, fishing, attending big-league sports events and participating in local cultural activities," Dean Fritchen, senior associate, Arvida Commercial Real Estate Services Commercial Division, Winter Park, FL, tells GlobeSt.com.

Fritchen says, "If all you've got to offer (in a community) is Mickey and Minnie Mouse and Goofy, you aren't always going to get the ear of some of the really top corporations, not that there is anything wrong with enjoying the Disney characters and their associates."