THE PROBLEM

The cultural sector is held together by organizations most people never see. They run emergency funds and microgrants, provide professional development and technical assistance, write visa letters, translate applications, conduct research, and carry the sector’s advocacy in City Hall and Albany. They move quickly when something breaks, and they know the field in ways no agency can.

The support structures around them have not kept pace. Public funding is largely organized around projects, while service work is continuous. Philanthropic interest in intermediaries has softened. Service organizations also frequently apply for the same funds as the artists and organizations they exist to support.

The category itself remains loosely defined and unevenly counted, which makes it difficult to argue for. This is a governance problem before it is a funding problem: decisions about who holds the sector together are being made without a shared picture of who is doing that work, what it costs, or how the pieces fit. The Institute’s interest here is in making that coordination intentional.

WHAT WE’RE DOING

COUNT. With Voices for Creative New York, we are the New York State research partner on the 2026 National ASO Survey, part of a multi-phase study led by ADC Consulting on the role and evolution of service, intermediary, and regranting organizations across the country. We contribute New York-specific questions, coordinate statewide outreach, and analyze the New York data.

ORGANIZE. We work alongside service organizations across New York City to make the case to the Department of Cultural Affairs for funding structures that recognize what this work actually is. The field is asking for regular access to decision-makers, an evaluation process that does not pit service organizations against their own constituents, and a partnership model built for ongoing work rather than discrete projects.

BUILD. Service organizations are among the strongest anchors in New York’s creative economy, and the ones closest to the workers a statewide plan would serve. Through the NYS Creative Economy Framework, we are connecting them across the state and bringing them into the process of shaping New York’s first Creative Economy Plan.

WHAT IT PRODUCES

• Evidence about what service organizations do, what they cost, and what they need, at the state and national scale.
• Funding structures that recognize service work as infrastructure rather than programming.
• A statewide network of service organizations connected to each other and to the making of New York’s creative economy policy.

WHO’S INVOLVED

The National ASO Survey is led by ADC Consulting, with Voices for Creative New York as New York State research partner. The Institute serves on VCNY’s leadership committee.

The New York City work runs through the Arts Service Organization Working Group convened by New Yorkers for Culture & Arts, which brings together roughly 25 organizations, among them A.R.T./New York, the Asian American Arts Alliance, Culture & Arts Policy Institute, Dance/NYC, Downtown Brooklyn Arts Alliance, IndieSpace, MAP Fund, Naturally Occurring Cultural Districts NY, and the NYC Arts in Education Roundtable.