Last month, the California Arts Commission released the state’s first-ever strategic plan to support its creative economy.
Santa Clarita city staff members say that the plan, called “California’s Future is Creative: Strategies for Cultural Resilience, Economic Growth and Global Leadership,” will likely inject resources into the city’s own creative economy – including, most famously, its film and television industry.
What those resources will look like, whether arts consultancy, grant funding or both, may be up in the air for some time.
Throughout 2026, according to the state plan document, the California Arts Commission will be drumming up public engagement and establishing interagency state workgroups.
The state plans to launch the resulting initiatives in March.
California’s Future is Creative came onto city Arts and Events Manager Phil Lantis’ radar shortly before the Santa Clarita Arts Commission met on Nov. 13, he said.
At the meeting, Lantis brought arts commissioners information about how other California cities had developed their own creative economy studies in anticipation of a Santa Clarita-specific study, but added the state’s plan would be an important project for Santa Clarita to utilize.
“California took the first step of creating a plan, which then will roll through the county, so we’ll … be made aware of opportunities in the next 18 months of what that will look like,” Lantis said.
Any arts initiatives that reach Santa Clarita will have a lot to work with, Lantis said.
“We have a lot of film production here … as well as a pretty vibrant nonprofit arts community,” Lantis said. “We really have a good foundation to build upon, as well as we have a lot of institutions that do have creative economy programs.”
That includes arts programs at California Institute of the Arts, The Master’s University and College of the Canyons, Lantis said, that use a “cradle to career” approach to bolstering Santa Clarita’s creative output.
California’s Future is Creative may roll out like other similar plans in the past, Lantis said, where local arts agency leads – in L.A. County’s case, its Department of Arts and Culture – will be contacted first.
Support for the state’s economic development is direly needed in the wake of COVID-19, according to a California Arts Council news release announcing the state plan.
Despite California leading the country in creative economic output, in 2024, the state’s creative workforce “remained 7% below pre-pandemic levels, even as overall state employment grew. Between 2022 and 2023, the state lost 2.6% of its creative-sector jobs, while the nation gained 0.3%.”
The goal of California’s Future is Creative is to reverse course on growing systemic weaknesses in California’s creative industries, including by providing support for creative businesses as they’re increasingly priced out of the state, protecting local cultural identity from gentrification, and addressing stunted career pathways to in-demand creative roles and a lack of access to benefits.
