by Bruce Checefsky

   Cleveland ranked 50th overall and 23rd among large communities in the 2025 Southern Methodist University (SMU) Arts Vibrancy Ranking. The SMU index measures arts supply, demand, public support, cost of living, and population size. In past years, Cleveland reached as high as 12th among large communities, yet it falls behind for independent artists and arts-based businesses, ranking 32nd of 39 and 233rd overall.

   This is not necessarily good news for independent artists in Cleveland.

   SMU DataArts, the National Center for Arts Research, analyzes vast datasets to understand sector trends, publish reports, and offer business intelligence to arts practitioners, funders, and policymakers. The research strengthens nonprofit arts and cultural organizations, enabling leaders to make informed decisions, improve their financial health, and build vibrant communities through evidence-based research, according to SMU.

   SMU DataArts released a study of the broader ecosystem in which individual arts organizations operate, identifying a range of community-level factors that influence organizational success. The study offers a framework for understanding where cultural ecosystems thrive beyond their financial performance, attendance patterns, and operational structures.

   Highlights from the analysis found small communities among top performers, including Jackson, Wyoming; Nantucket, Massachusetts; and Juneau, Alaska; contradicting the notion that vibrant arts ecosystems are determined by population size. Small commutes with strong cultural infrastructure rank among the nation’s top communities.

   California dominated the cultural standings in San Francisco-San Mateo-Redwood City (#2), Los Angeles-Long Beach-Glendale (#12), and San Rafael (#19). Southern arts centers showcase the South’s vibrant cultural scenes, including Nashville-Davidson-Murfreesboro-Franklin, Tennessee (#8) and New Orleans-Metairie, LA (#16).

   The Greater Cleveland Music Census conducted a survey in 2023 of over 2,700 music professionals (musicians, venue staff, etc.) to understand the scene’s economic/social impact, revealing a strong but struggling industry in need of more advocacy and marketing support. Challenges include low pay and the need for a music commission. A majority of Greater Cleveland musicians held non-music jobs, and a significant percentage of venues were unprofitable, citing marketing and talent costs as issues.

   Over 76% of respondents supported a music commission for advocacy, grants, and live programming. Top concerns for musicians included low/uncertain pay, lack of benefits, and the increasing cost of living.

   Rhonda Brown, Senior Advisor, Arts & Culture, City of Cleveland, said, in response to the data, “The City allocated $3 million through our Transformative Arts Fund last year—an unprecedented investment by the Bibb Administration, as it was the largest grant program (in terms of award amounts to individual artists) in Cleveland’s history.”

   Despite the SMU DataArts findings, Cuyahoga Arts & Culture (CAC) awarded over $12.9 million in 2025 to 300 organizations, including General Operating Support (GOS) for 70 groups and Project Support for 217 projects.

   Assembly for the Arts, in close partnership with CAC, distributes funds to individual artists in Greater Cleveland through various programs, with specific amounts varying by grant, such as $10,000 for the Creative Impact Fund (for established artists) or $5,000 for early-career artists, and smaller $1,500 Boost Fund grants, alongside project-specific grants like Rapid Action Grants (up to $2,000). The Transformative Arts Fund awarded $3 million in grants of $250,000 to $500,000 to artists last year.

   Several contentious public CAC meetings in 2023 forced the agency to increase the number and amount of grants available to individual artists.

   The CAC board voted in December of that year to approve $400,000 for the Assembly to manage the Support for Artists program, adding another $100,000, but only after the board president, Nancy Mendez, publicly admitted CAC had not paid out grants to individual artists in 2018 and 2019, and again in 2021. She said the artist’s money went into the general operating support. A public records request by CoolCleveland confirmed the financial discrepancy. Mendez eventually left the board presidency.

   Jeremy Johnson, president and CEO of the Assembly for the Arts, added that Cleveland continues to rank in the top tier nationally for arts and cultural vibrancy, placing in the top 5% of more than 900 U.S. communities. The latest rankings reflect a change in DataArts’ methodology, he said, which now compares communities of all sizes together rather than by population.

   “Indicators related to independent artists and arts-based businesses are based on national datasets. SMU DataArts is best positioned to explain how those measures are constructed and how recent methodological updates affect the results,” said Johnson.

   “Locally, our focus remains on long-term growth—strengthening nonprofit arts organizations, supporting individual artists, and expanding creative businesses across Greater Cleveland.”

   When asked about the decline in ranking for Cleveland, Jill Paulsen, executive director of CAC, referred the question to their contacts at SMU, Liz Quinn and Allison Heishman, noting that “SMU can speak to the methodology of their research (and any changes in their approach over the years).”

   In an email response, Kathie Ingersol, SMU DataArts director of communications, engagement, and strategy, provided additional context by advising caution when interpreting year-to-year shifts in the rankings.

   “Rankings convey the relative position but not the magnitude of difference in the metrics between communities,” she said. “The actual differences between ranked places can be much larger or smaller than the rankings suggest, and shifts over time may reflect small changes in the underlying data.”

   “Changes in rankings do not always directly correlate to changes in a community on the underlying measures. Instead, other places may have changed or seen slower growth in population or faster increases in cost of living.”

   Ingersol added, “There was also a change in the geographical boundaries under consideration for the Cleveland area in the 2025 index. We use Core Based Statistical Areas (CBSAs) to calculate the index, and the boundaries of some of these CBSAs changed in our 2025 edition because of an update from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).”

   She noted that while SMU DataArts only publishes rankings for the top 100, there are 948 CBSAs across the country, so a ranking of 233 is still within the top 25% nationally.

   Sean Watterson, co-owner of Happy Dog in the Detroit-Shoreway neighborhood, head of the Cleveland Independent Venue Association, and key architect for the Greater Cleveland Music Census, agrees that Cleveland is near the top in some of the nonprofit categories but “near the bottom in the individual artist and arts-based industries.”

   “The numbers for arts and cultural firms, or for-profit businesses, are even worse,” said Watterson. “We rank 37th among large communities and 243rd overall. The biggest room for improvement is helping individual and independent artists and art-based industries.”

   Artist Liz Maugans, faculty at Cleveland State University School of Art and Design and curator & director of YARDS Projects, said Cleveland’s recent decline in national rankings for individual artist support reflects long-standing structural challenges and trust issues with Cuyahoga Arts and Culture and a lack of investment and priority by the City of Cleveland.

   “CAC funding has always prioritized nonprofit institutions, with less than three percent of cigarette tax revenue reaching individual artists and arts-based businesses—a share that has remained largely unchanged,” said Maugans.

   The local art activist continued, “Artists working within nonprofits are experiencing wage stagnation and staff reductions in this volatile economic climate. The region lacks consistent data. As the population continues to decline, we need to communicate the value of creatives. We need to understand the resources available to them; coordination between arts leadership and investment to reverse this trend is desperately lacking.”