Thursday, September 30, 2021
Senators Aim to Extend Save Our Stages Grant Deadline for Indie Venues
Variety: Senators John Cornyn (R-TX) and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) today introduced the
“SOS Extension Act,” which would extend the timeline for using Small Business Administration Shuttered Venue Operators Grants, created by his bipartisan Save Our Stages Act, from the end of 2021 to spring of 2023.
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2 comments:
This is very frustrating to read about. The Save our Stages was meant to make it so venues could pay their employees and take care of their needs while a larger plan was worked out (or until Covid was no longer a concern). But we haven't gotten to the point of either scenario. We have no larger government plan to assist venues and Covid variants are prolific and still causing issues. I also want to point out that this is a great fund used to save the venues themselves, under the plan that they will then be paying their employees. There is no plan to directly pay the people for these jobs. Companies can apply for these grants and there is no guarantee that they will use it to pay their people any better. This also only applies to physical locations, making it harder for companies who do not have a home place, to get funds and help their people.
I am so glad that they extended the Save Our Stages act. This is so needed. The effects of covid and its regulations are still impacting the entertainment industry and specifically the theatre industry. I am glad it is extended all the way into 2023. It is extremely maddening to hear the resource allocation delays but also not that surprising when considering it is funding coming from the government. I hope that the issues about the timeline brought up in this article are addressed in the continue funding process. I am glad that people higher up are understanding the significant strain on the industry. We need to to keep art alive. The knowledge gaps that have occurred in small institutional levels will create larger gaps in the industry if we do not get up and going again. I do fear that our industry will keep needing assistance as long as new variants keep coming up because people refuse to get vaccinated.
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