The Curious Proposal to Fund New Hampshire’s Arts Council With $1

The notice that landed in the inbox of Elliott Cunningham, the managing director of New Hampshire’s oldest playhouse, provided little explanation. But it made clear that the federal grant it had been awarded for a traveling production about a 12-year-old boy exploring backyard trails was no longer available.

He expects a similar message from state funding sources to come next.

Support for New Hampshire’s arts council is at risk as legislators finalize a two-year state budget this week. After one lawmaker suggested eliminating the organization, another countered with a proposal that the council should instead receive $1.

The proposed cuts looked similar to President Trump’s move to eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts. In her inaugural address in January, Gov. Kelly Ayotte, a Republican, announced the formation of the Commission on Government Efficiency, a state version of the Department of Government Efficiency.

The message has been clear: Reduce the size of government and trim budgets.

To many state legislators, shrinking revenue means tough decisions. To arts administrators, the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts is essential to sustaining the theaters, museums and festivals that help give the “Live free or die” state its character.

Last fiscal year the arts council gave the New London Barn Playhouse, where Mr. Cunningham works, a $21,250 grant to upgrade its sound system. The council also helped pay for a wheelchair-accessible lift backstage at the Capitol Center for the Arts in Concord, for broadband upgrades at the New England Ski Museum in Franconia and for new floors at a dance studio in Lebanon.

“There are a million places in this country that have a million strip malls that all look exactly the same,” said Sal Prizio, the executive director of the Capitol Center for the Arts, which is blocks away from the State House. “You’re killing the things that make New Hampshire, New Hampshire.”