Minnesota Citizens for the Arts (MCA) is a statewide arts advocacy organization that organizes the arts community to lobby the Minnesota State Legislature and Congress. Our mission is to ensure opportunity for all people to have access to and involvement in the arts.
Accomplishments
MCA’s successes include increasing the state’s appropriation for the arts from no financial commitment to a high point of over $40.7 million annually, preventing substantial decreases in arts funding, securing and protecting the tax exemptions that benefit philanthropic and nonprofit arts organizations in Minnesota, and working on behalf of nonprofit arts organizations with Minnesota’s Congressional delegation.
Our biggest success to date came with passage of the Clean Water, Land and Legacy Amendment in 2008, which put dedicated funding for the arts into Minnesota’s Constitution for the next 25 years.
MCA also has gained the support of most of Minnesota’s federal Congressional delegation for the arts and culture on the federal level.
MCA has worked in recent years with other nonprofit partners to fight off attempts to tax nonprofits and to pass the Minnesota Charitable Giving Relief Act, which allows non-itemizers to get a tax deduction of 50% of their contributions of over $500 per year to charities.
MCA received the Sally Irvine Ordway Award for Commitment in 2002 and was rated as a Top Nonprofit by Guidestar and Philanthropedia in 2012.
