The Kenosha Creative Economy Strategic Plan

The Kenosha Creative Economy Strategic Plan
April 3, 2015
Purpose
The City of Kenosha Commission on the Arts is promoting the development of this plan to encourage stakeholders to quantify the effects of the creative economy on the region’s economy as a whole. As the plan recognizes the contributions and relationships involved in the Creative sector, it should also better identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and an action plan that drives benefit for individual creatives, their organizations and businesses, and the community into the future.
The plan should provide a baseline of the current state of the arts, a vision for the future state, near and long-term actions, recommend responsible parties for driving those actions to completion, and measurements of success. The plan should be a shared vision among all arts-related organizations and stakeholders including education, individual artists, commercial entities featuring the arts, non-profit arts groups, consumers, elected officials, and economic development organizations.
The Commission on the Arts foresees successful implementation of the plan resulting in additional investment in the community’s creative economy; greater awareness and recognition of the arts as one of the community’s strengths–both as a source of entertainment and as a potential career; that young people eyeing a future in the arts see that they could successfully develop their artistic capabilities in Kenosha; and, overall, an improved quality of life.
The arts have been identified as a valuable asset in other Kenosha-centered reports and plans designed to strengthen its economic sustainability, image, and quality of life. These reports (including but not limited to the Lakota Group’s Downtown Kenosha plan, DCI’s Kenosha Branding plan, the plans for the lakefront parks development and individual arts organizations’ plans) should be considered as resources for the Creative Economy plan. However, we urge the planning group to use the members’ creativity to move past perceived barriers and current structures to see what could be possible.
We believe that the arts are a major component of Kenosha’s quality of life. It lends the community joy and vibrancy. The arts are an essential component of Kenosha’s past, present, and future. This plan aims to offer an actionable and measurable roadmap to a vital creative economy.