Diablo Regional Arts Association

Diablo Regional Arts Association is the primary fundraising and marketing organization of the Lesher Center for the Arts, a city-owned and city-run facility in Walnut Creek. Since the city offers no curation of events, marketing or fundraising services, the Association focuses on engaging East Bay audiences, and ensuring the professional quality of the 300 arts performances at the Center each year, reaching 300,000 people. It provides strategic support for the Center’s anchor producers through a competitive grant program which distributed $260,000 in 2012, and broadens arts participation by providing arts experiences to nearly 6,000 school children at live performances at the Lesher Center. An Organizational Effectiveness grant would enable the Association to assess alternative public/private partnership models to improve its organizational effectiveness in working with the municipality, and consider ways of taking on more operational responsibilities for the center.

Diablo Regional Arts Association (DRAA) is the primary fundraising organization of the Lesher Center for the Arts, a city-owned and city-run facility in Walnut Creek. Since the city offers no curation of events, marketing or fundraising services, DRAA focuses on engaging East Bay audiences, and ensuring the professional quality of the 300 arts performances at the Center each year. It provides strategic support for the Center’s anchor producers through a competitive grant program which distributed $185,000 in 2010, broadens arts participation by providing arts experiences to more than 3,000 school children at live performances at the Lesher Center, and offers marketing services to the Center’s producers, which includes website and print design. Continued support of DRAA would help to ensure its ability to maintain and enhance current programs, and to serve its mission to create avenues for everyone to enjoy the arts.