The Cambridge Centre for the Arts has been part of our community for over twenty years, although many people, especially newcomers to Cambridge, have no idea it exists.
Located next to City Hall, it officially opened in May 2001.
At the time it was a huge undertaking, the concept begun by a group of dedicated volunteers who needed to persuade the city that an arts facility was needed as much as sports facilities.
To me, as a volunteer heavily involved from concept to completion, it was a most challenging undertaking and a steep learning curve.
Here is some of the background history.
In 1994 the Cambridge Arts Forum brought forth the suggestion to city council that the former Capitol Theatre on Water Street be renovated into an arts centre. Despite extensive research, a spectacular presentation, and a delegation over 100 strong, council were not convinced of the need.
The Capitol was razed for a parking lot. However Mayor Jane Brewer was persuaded to set aside $100,000 for a feasibility study to determine the needs of the arts community. This was red flagged which meant if certain conditions were not met within a year, the funds would return to the general budget.
In 1997 Roger Jones was the consultant hired by Jim King, (Commissioner of Community Services) to undertake the study.
Some of the funds set aside would be used to pay the consultant. After an extensive interview process involving those involved in the arts disciplines Jones completed his report in 1998. It was determined by city staff and council that a “strong grass roots movement” from within the community must be shown before the project could move forward.
Of the five buildings identified as offering suitable space, the best one appeared to be the unused portion of the David Durward Centre.
I expressed an interest in being on a committee. Later to my astonishment both Jim King and Roger Jones informed me I was to be the chair of the committee.
“Oh no, that will be up to the committee” was my response. “Well, the good news is you get to select your own committee.”
In other words, there was no committee.
Not one to be blocked by obstacles in my way I set out to find a committee and began by asking a local lawyer if he were interested.
His reply was not very uplifting, “No I’m not, I read the names the report suggestion of possible leaders, all high-profile businessmen, your name was never even mentioned.” He was right, but for me, he had inadvertently set me a challenge. I’d do my utmost to move this project forward. I felt passionate about the need for arts to flourish in our community.
As a naively optimistic volunteer my learning curve was about to begin.
A varied group selected from theatre arts, art gallery owners, business, and the seniors’ centres agreed to form a committee. The first order of business was to persuade council to remove the “red flag” on the funds set aside by Mayor Jane Brewer.
The committee were to determine the logistics and operational activity of the centre once opened, but the unexpected death of the fundraising chair meant our committee also had to raise the funds. Not to be stopped by another obstacle now my attitude was my committee would somehow raise the funds too. We needed to educate the public of our proposed plans to get that “ground swell of support.”
I met with each councillor asking what their objection to such a facility might be, then we prepared our report to council to address those objections.
Our committee, known as the Cambridge Arts Guild, persuaded hundreds of people from all arts disciplines to attend the meeting. We flooded the council chambers with artists, actors, musicians, literary addicts, photographers, businesspeople, and others. We were ecstatic when the red flag was removed.
We hired a part time summer student, Anne Meighan, an arts activist. We arranged to have a telephone line installed. We were given a desk in a corner of the David Durward Centre. Now we were ready to start.
Our job was to raise thousands of dollars, get the public educated as to our purpose and hopefully prove a strong grass roots wish for such a centre existed. There were many more mountains to climb before we achieved this, we held three public open houses for people to ask questions.
During my introduction I mentioned that if any one were interested enough to ask a question, in order to obtain an answer, there was a cost. A minimum of 25 cents toward our fundraising.
Mayor Jane Brewer declared it the most blatant fundraising she had ever seen, but it worked. That evening we collected $300 in what became jokingly known over the next couple of years as “Jill’s Jar.”
Never having raised funds before I quickly learned don’t waffle, ask outright for the dollar amount what you want, then tell the person specifically what they will get in return. The answer is then either yes or no. This took time, effort, ingenuity but as we progressed it became clear our dream had a chance of becoming a reality.
Passion and enthusiasm go a long way toward achieving goals, our committee had that in spades.
As new ideas for fundraising evolved and succeeded, we grew more confident. We had no official status other than enthusiastic volunteers, but our passion was infectious. Money began to come in, in total we raised half a million dollars. Numerous presentations to companies and interested high profile citizens were held over the next three years.
The highlight being when Toyota made a significant commitment, we were certain the city would be convinced that a “ground swell of community support” had been established.
The grand Opening in May 2001 was a splendid day long celebration with thousands in attendance.
Until the pandemic the centre flourished, hundreds of children and adults took classes in art, pottery, dance, drama, The centre was a hive of activity. The pandemic closed the centre for two years. It is now open again, and hopefully within a few months it will return to its previous level of activity.
For such a community initiative to have come together to get it built, it needs the full support of the community and the city to continue its success.
