Boston’s mayoral candidates try to win over artists worried about displacement and funding

On Wednesday, Boston’s mayoral candidates made their pitch to the city’s arts and culture sector.

Mayor Michelle Wu, Josh Kraft and Domingos DaRosa attended a forum at Dorchester’s Strand Theatre moderated by Jared Bowen, host of GBH’s “The Culture Show.” The event, which drew approximately 350 attendees, was organized by arts advocacy group MassCreative as part of its Create the Vote Boston 2025 campaign. Mayoral candidate Robert Cappucci, a former police officer and businessman, did not attend.

In questions submitted before the forum, audience members were most concerned about funding for the arts and the threat of displacement faced by artists in an increasingly expensive city, issues that Mayor Wu addressed at length. Kraft, a philanthropist and the son of the billionaire Robert Kraft, emphasized partnerships with the private sector and the need for artists to feel “safe” expressing themselves. Community organizer Domingos DaRosa made a splash with impassioned speeches on behalf of Boston's most marginalized.

The candidates did not appear together, but instead took turns in conversation with Bowen for 30 minutes each. Wu took the stage first, and used her time to tout the achievements of her administration and her personal connection to the arts. When asked about a recent impactful Boston arts experience, Wu, a trained pianist, brought up her appearance last year at Symphony Hall.

“I’m still not quite over the part terror, part glee,” Wu said. “Being onstage with the Boston Pops for ‘Rhapsody in Blue,’ that is a highlight of my life, I think, forever.”

Kraft, on the other hand, struggled to respond to a question about his favorite local venues, finally landing on the underground nightclub The Channel, which, he acknowledged, shuttered decades ago.

DaRosa briefly floundered with the same question, but quickly pivoted to inequities in access to the arts.

“Boston has a way of killing cultures by killing people's music, killing people's food, and we have to change that,” DaRosa concluded, drawing applause.

Boston has a way of killing cultures by killing people's music, killing people's food, and we have to change that.

Domingos DaRosa

Wu, by contrast, promoted her achievements in the arts. Several times, the mayor brought up her administration’s allocation of $26 million in ARPA funds to the city’s cultural sector, which included large grants to 11 local arts organizations serving youth, LGBTQ artists and communities of color. Wu also touted the Boston Family Days program, which provides school-aged children and their families free access to Boston cultural institutions. And she trumpeted the city’s efforts to preserve artist workspace in a challenging real estate environment, making specific mention of plans to transform a city-owned building in Allston-Brighton into music rehearsal space.

“ What I hear about with the most urgency, and often desperation, is the risk of displacement of artists and creatives,” Wu said. “That is a space issue. It's an affordability issue, and it's also a just resource issue overall. And we've been trying to plug the gaps in all of those areas.”

In response to the question of artist displacement, Kraft said, “ First and foremost, we need to create more housing.”

Kraft also pitched an idea for including commercial artist space in an opt-in rent control plan, eliciting approval from the audience.

The mayor, in turn, drew applause for her response to a question about how artists could be of service to her.

“ I am determined that Boston will continue to be a city that refuses to back down, not to kings, not to bullies, not to people who want to take us backward,” Wu said. “The arts are absolutely critical to providing the fuel and the momentum and the care that can keep us moving forward.”

The arts are absolutely critical to providing the fuel and the momentum and the care that can keep us moving forward.

Mayor Michelle Wu

Wu faced her toughest question about the Chief of Arts and Culture position, which has been vacant since January. Boston’s previous arts and culture chief, Kara Elliott-Ortega, was popular among members of the arts sector and was instrumental in the city taking a more direct role in combatting artist displacement.

“We’re in a very active search process now,” Wu said.

DaRosa saw the position’s ongoing vacancy as an opportunity to draw a contrast with the mayor.

“How much planning do you need?” he scoffed, before pitching an idea for a chief of arts and culture for each of Boston’s 23 neighborhoods.

DaRosa offered few other policy ideas for the city’s creative sector. But he nevertheless managed to connect with the audience by turning the conversation to education, the bloated police overtime budget and the daily realities faced by people living in Boston's less wealthy neighborhoods.

“ My top priority is education. That's where we start. That changes everything,” said DaRosa, who was born in Cape Verde and graduated from Madison Park Technical Vocational High School in Roxbury. “You put education back at the top of the list, our children now become successful. [They’re] not looking for low income housing. Why? Because they got a career.”

Both Kraft and Wu acknowledged a need to assist institutions impacted by federal cuts to the arts. Cultural institutions have lost federal grants after clawbacks of NEA and NEH funding, and they worry about the chilling effects of Trump's anti-DEI campaign. Kraft expressed an interest in looking to the private sector to help fill funding gaps, while Wu offered a defiant response.

“ We have gone to court now multiple times. I think we're involved in six different lawsuits with the Trump administration,” the mayor said. “[We are]  being clear that when they award funding for a continuum of care to address housing insecurity, which affects everyone in our community, including the arts and culture sector, that those funds cannot be conditioned on being anti-DEI, anti-LGBTQ.”

DaRosa struck a more critical tone.

“ We cut our legs from under us when we told the federal government we're not playing ball,” he said, in an apparent reference to Wu’s commitment to maintaining Boston’s sanctuary city status. “As mayor, I would've kept my line of communication open. I would've negotiated with the federal government and I would've let Boston Police handle how we go about doing things humane.”

As people streamed out of the theater after the forum, mariachi musician Veronica Robles offered her impressions of the candidates. She hadn’t known much about DaRosa before, but found him likeable.

“He understands living in Boston,” Robles said, though she worried that he hadn’t had much exposure to the arts.

But her biggest praise was reserved for Mayor Wu. The Veronica Robles Cultural Center in East Boston was one of the recipients of an ARPA-funded grant.

“I got the cultural investment grant, and that helped me a lot,” Robles said. “So [Wu] really opened it up. She opened City Hall to diverse people.”

The candidates will face off on September 9th in a nonpartisan preliminary election.