Regular Meeting

CITY OF ELKO ARTS AND CULTURE ADVISORY BOARD REGULAR MEETING 4:30 PM, WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 2024 ELKO CITY HALL, COUNCIL CHAMBERS 1751 COLLEGE AVENUE, ELKO, NV 89801 I. CALL TO ORDER Vice-Chairperson Sharon Owen called the meeting of the Arts and Cultural Advisory Board to order at 4:44 PM. II. ROLL CALL Present: Sharon Owen, ACAB Vice-Chairperson Casey Bennett, ACAB Secretary Mandy Simons, Councilwoman Absent: Mica Johnson, ACAB Chairperson City Staff Present: Scott Wilkinson, Assistant City Manager Annette Robinson, City Clerk Nichole Stephens, City Clerk Technician II Rachel Randall, Planning Technician III. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE IV. COMMENTS BY THE GENERAL PUBLIC A. Pursuant to N.R.S. 241, this time is devoted to comments by the public, if any, and discussion of those comments. No action may be taken upon a matter raised under this item on the agenda until the matter itself has been specifically included on a successive agenda and identified as an item for possible action. ACTION WILL NOT BE TAKEN Ms. Owen called for public comment without a response. V. APPROVAL OF MINUTES A. Approval of Minutes for the September 4, 2024, Regular Session ** A motion was made by Member Simons, seconded by Secretary Bennett to approve the minutes from the September 4, 2024, Regular Session. The motion passed unanimously. (3-0) November 6, 2024 Arts and Culture | Minutes Page 1 of 5 VI. UNFINISHED BUSINESS A. Review, discussion, and possible action on the Power/Signal Box Project, and matters related thereto. FOR POSSIBLE ACTION Scott Wilkinson, Assistant City Manager, opened up the discussion. He reported that he has done a little bit of research, and Vegas has a partnership program. He thought we may be able to enter into a contract directly with NV Energy to paint some of their power boxes, but has been unsuccessful in finding any further information. He reached out to a contact at NV Energy about three weeks ago, but has yet to hear back. He will follow up with them to find out if NV Energy has a program with them directly. He pointed out that the program down in Vegas is pretty large and well-funded, with three different entities involved in that program. He is not sure if that would work for Elko, as we would need to go out and try to find partners. He stated working directly with NV Energy would be ideal, however given our history while looking at some of our signal boxes in the past, our staff is not comfortable with painting those boxes. Down in Vegas, they do paint them and we could kind of revisit that if we can’t get something kick started with NV Energy. Council Member Mandy Simons responded saying she knows that sometimes NV Energy is hard to get a response from. She suggested maybe reaching out to other communities that have done it and just ask questions. What type of paint do you use? What is your maintenance like? Does it have any affects you have to mitigate? There are probably protocols or techniques that we should know about. That might be our best bet if we can’t get ahold of NV. Mr. Wilkinson said he knew at one time, NV Energy did have their own program and you could enter into a contract directly with them. When he searched NV Energy's website, he was unable to come up with that. He looked at Vegas and they have a pretty comprehensive program that's well- funded, but there’s three different entities that are participating. NV Energy is part of that, but he is not sure we need to go that far here and we should try to keep it a little simpler. Ms. Owen asked if this is something we'd like to continue on the agenda. She suggested we refocus on this in the spring after we get through some of the awards and other priorities that seem favorable to the board. ** A motion was made by Secretary Bennett, seconded by Member Simons to table the Power Signal Box project and matters related thereto until April of 2025. The motion passed unanimously. (3-0) B. Review, discussion, and possible action concerning the 2026 Sestercentennial Art Project, and matters related thereto. FOR POSSIBLE ACTION Mr. Wilkinson began by saying the last time we were able to discuss this with our new members, there were a lot of questions on whether to move forward with this project. He stated there also was some discussion on the potential cost of the project and how we might fundraise for it. We need to November 6, 2024 Arts and Culture | Minutes Page 2 of 5 identify somebody who can really dedicate a lot of time to that effort, or consider if this is still a project the board wishes to take on. Mr. Bennett noted that the cost is around $413,000 and we would need a project manager. We would need someone to keep up the maintenance on the parking lot section. He asked if the management would be through the City, and if they would be able to take on the workload of having an additional parking lot by Bullion Road. Mr. Wilkinson answered yes. He thinks it would be a small parking lot, and city council is in favor of the project to a degree, within its capabilities. They have agreed to parcel out property in support of that. The funding is the biggest issue. It would be a burden to maintain. The facility department is small and very busy all day long. He believes if the board wanted to move forward, the city would probably accept those considerations. Ms. Owen said one of her largest concerns is this isn't a funded item. After some investigating some of the other communities involved with projects of a similar nature, she had a hard time finding anything that fit this capacity in a physical sculpture. She said much of what she found was related more to a civic orientation of the 250th anniversary, such as storytelling and other opportunities. She did discover there were limited grants available that were either closed at this point as far as available funding or were more civically oriented. There is not a Nevada council or group that is involved with this type of effort like there are in other states. She said she is thankful for the work put into planning the novelty of this, but feels this is not an appropriate ask of our community, the city or other people at this time. She thinks we could recognize this in a different and financially responsible way, and is not in favor of this either. ** A motion was made by Vice Chair Owen, seconded by Secretary Bennett to revise the intention of the 2026 Sestercentennial Art Project to be more inclusive or of a different scope to potentially be more culturally oriented or potentially smaller in scope. The motion passed unanimously. (3-0) VII. NEW BUSINESS A. Review, discussion, and possible action concerning the Mayor Arts Awards, and matters related thereto. FOR POSSIBLE ACTION The Mayor Arts Awards event is a two-step process. 1. Selection of an artist to create the award. 2. Selection of award recipients. The board needs to establish a date range for the “Call to Artists”, along with a final submission deadline. It is recommended the renderings be submitted to the city by November 15. SAW Mr. Wilkinson pointed out that may be too short of a time frame. He mentioned Jodi crafted a flyer for their consideration (found in Minutes packet) for the call to the artist that would create the awards. He asked the board to look at the flyer, see if they approve or have any changes, and then establish a date range for submissions for the awards. He said after submissions are received, we’ll bring them back to the board for selection and move into the next step. November 6, 2024 Arts and Culture | Minutes Page 3 of 5 Ms. Simons asked how we advertise this. Mr. Wilkinson said this will be posted in City Hall, on our website, and we do some PSAs with it too. Mr. Bennett said he thinks the submission deadline is a little bit too early. The artists would only have nine days. He suggested the 27th, which is three weeks for the submission deadline. Ms. Owen asked if we could even extend it to the end of the month due to the Thanksgiving recess and suggested the 30th instead. She added the flyer Jodi crafted looks nice and captures what is important to know. ** A motion was made by Member Simons, seconded by Secretary Bennett to authorize the City to advertise for a call for artists for submissions for the Elko Mayor’s Art Award with the submission deadline of November 30th. The motion passed unanimously. (3-0) Ms. Owen asked how the second step proceeds. Ms. Simons responded they could authorize that today too. What they’ve done in the past is send out a call to the art club and different entities. Mr. Wilkinson said he thinks we should wait and make sure we have an award along with an artist to create the award and then move to the next step. He said they will do a send out requesting nominations, then the nominations will come back to the board and they’ll select the recipients for the awards. VIII. REPORTS Mr. Bennett reported the Elko High School Theater Department will be performing The Great Gatsby November 14th through the 16th. The 14th and 15th will be at 6:30 PM, and the 16th will be at 2:00 PM. He said the Broadway Review is happening from the 7th until the 9th. It starts around 6:30-ish at the Elko High School Performing Arts Building. He added that on November 23rd, the Elko Community Orchestra is having their concert at the Elko High School Performing Arts Building. Ms. Owen said she had a question related to the current discussion and previous discussion on different strategies for calendaring. She found that the Convention Center has their own calendar, along with several others. She does not want to duplicate efforts, but the website for this board has some invalid links and outdated information. She started curating a bunch of community groups and their websites and social media pages. She asked if that could be made into a document and hosted on the webpage to make the introduction to these groups around town without having to maintain a calendar. November 6, 2024 Arts and Culture | Minutes Page 4 of 5  Annette Robinson, City Clerk, stated she maintains the website and she can figure out what’s going on and post links under the board’s page. IX. SCHEDULE THE NEXT MEETING The next Arts and Cultural Advisory Board Meeting will be held December 4th, 2024, at 4:30 PM. X. COMMENTS BY THE GENERAL PUBLIC A. Pursuant to N.R.S. 241, this time is devoted to comments by the public, if any, and discussion of those comments. No action may be taken upon a matter raised under this item on the agenda until the matter itself has been specifically included on a successive agenda and identified as an item for possible action. ACTION WILL NOT BE TAKEN Ms. Owens called for public comment without a response. There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 5:11 PM. Scott Wilkinson, Assistant City Manager Arts and Culture Advisory Board November 6, 2024 Arts and Culture | Minutes Page 5 of 5