about usuaf

The United States Urban Arts Federation (USUAF) is an Americans for the Arts alliance of the chief executives of local arts agencies in the nation's 60 largest cities. These leaders advocate, network, and meet to discuss the social, educational, and economic impact of the arts in their regions.

A local arts agency (LAA) promotes, supports, and develops the arts at the local level to strengthen the daily fabric of community living. Each LAA is as unique as the community it serves and they all share the goal of enabling diverse forms of arts and culture to thrive, ensuring that they are available to every member of that community. Local arts agencies throughout the United States comprise Americans for the Arts’ core constituency.

USUAF Membership Criteria:

• The LAA must represent one of the 60 largest cities by population size
• The LAA must be a full service agency providing an array of the following: competitive grantmaking, public art, technical assistance, facilities management, arts education programs, cultural tourism programs, and other services.
• The representative to USUAF must be the LAA executive or their delegate.

USUAF Goals:

• Establish and exchange information around innovation in the field in the area of public policy, programming, outreach, arts education, and fundraising by sharing best practices.
• Share best practices on risk-taking that generated meaningful public and private sector policies that collectively strengthened local communities in the United States.
• Act as advocates on urban arts issues both on local, statewide and national levels to bring awareness of local arts agencies and the value of the arts to ensure that the arts thrive in America.

If you have any questions or need more information, please contact Director of Local Arts Advancement and staff liaison to the United States Urban Arts Federation at usuaf@artsusa.org.