Updated April 19, 2018 at 8:00 a.m.
By Chris B. Bennett
The Seattle Medium
Parents and supporters of the Teen Summer Musical Program are actively trying to persuade Christopher Williams, the acting superintendent of the City of Seattle’s Parks and Recreation Department, to fully fund the popular youth program this year.
The program, which, according to the City of Seattle’s website — gives youth of color a chance to use their talents in a professional production, and to significantly increase life, work and social skills — is scheduled to receive a decrease in funding from the Parks dept. this year. Something that parents feel could be the end of a program that “has a long-lasting positive effect on its participants.”
According to Christina Hirsch, interim communications manager for the Parks Dept. (Parks), the program is being cut due to funding issues. The proposed cuts will mean that the program will be limited to 50 participants, will no longer include 8-12 year-old participants (commonly referred to as “minis”), and instead of being housed at a major theatrical arena like the Moore Theater, Paramount Theater or Benaroya Hall the performances will take place at the Paul Robeson Performing Art Center (the Auditorium at Rainier Beach High School).
This year, Parks is budgeting $115,000 for the production, which is approximately $35,000 less than the expenditures for last year’s production – The Wiz, and Parks projects that the production will fall $15,000 – $35,000 short of the actual production costs. Despite speculation to the contrary, Parks says that the program will take place this year.
“The 2018 Teen Summer Musical will indeed take place,” said Hirsch in an email to The Seattle Medium. “However, we have made the following modification: after careful consideration of all available resources needed to make the musical fun and meaningful for all participants, participation will be limited to youth aged 13 to 18.”
In a social media post to Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan, LaCretiah Claytor, the mother of one of last year’s program participants, expressed her concern about the cuts to the program.
“I understand that this widely favored/featured/treasured CULTURALLY ENRICHING program is in jeopardy of being ripped out from under its creativity and brilliance,” said Claytor. “In light of the current climate that young kids of color are facing is now the time to cut funding and creativity to a treasured program?”
Fearful of losing the program for good, Claytor, other parents and program participants have been very active on social media calling for City leaders to keep the program intact.
According to Isiah Anderson, Jr., writer/director/producer of the program’s performances, in an interview with The Seattle Medium promoting the 2017 Teen Summer Musical, over 200 youth auditioned to be in last year’s production. The program not only is a training ground for young aspiring actors/singers/dancers, but it also provides participants an opportunity to play roles that they normally are not getting a chance to play.
The final production saw 64 youth aged 13-18 and 38 minis spend 8 hours per day, 5 days per week, for a total of 9 weeks perfecting their craft in a performance that received rave reviews from all across the city.
According to a survey of program participants from last year, over 75% improved their public speaking and acting skills; 85% grew more comfortable receiving feedback, and 72% learned and practiced problem-solving skills.
According to the Parks Dept., the program has been operating since its inception without a dedicated line item for it in the budget. But the program has been sustained throughout the years through partnerships with the City of Seattle Office of Arts and Culture, Langston Hughes Performing Art Institute Board, Department of Neighborhood, and Atlantic Street Center.
According to Charles Humphrie, the former manager of a citywide teen and young adult programs with the City of Seattle, last year the program, which fell under his jurisdiction, had over 5,000 people attend its performances at the Moore Theater and was a tremendous success.
The show sold out Sunday, was close to selling out Saturday, and organizers were looking to move this year’s production to Benaroya Hall, where they were projecting to make a larger profit.
“We generated $55,000 – $60,000 [last year from ticket sales],” said Humphrie, who retired from the City in February. “This was the first time that we actually covered the cost of our venue and we’d actually had a venue to have to cut us a check at the end of the show, as opposed to us owing them.”
Despite the success of last year’s performance, Parks, after taking into account revenues and expenses, spent approximately $90,000 from its general fund to support the program, and was “$28,400 in the red.”
As it relates to the sustainability of this and similar programs, Humphrie says that there are always budget concerns within the city, but when people within the system are committed to a program they can find the resources that they need in order to make it happen.
“There’s always going to be budgetary concerns [with programs in the City],” said Humprie. “You’re talking to a person who was involved in management as well as operating community centers since 1996. So I understand that commitment to making things happen.”
“There isn’t any identified funding for the actual production. But when we’re asking for $70,000 to $100,000 dollars for the production, it can happen,” Humphries continued. “$100,000 for the magnitude of affecting 200 kids and the parents and the community is a drop in the bucket.”
“These kids put in over 400 hours of a summer to this production,” Humphrie continued. “400 hours worth of hands on [experience] from a music director who is a professor at college. These are high level people within the community that are working with these kids. I mean it’s a great program.”
According to many observers, the elimination of the minis is a major blow to the program. Not only are the minis fun to watch, but they are the life-blood of the program. The minis not only act as the pipeline for the program, as they grow up in the program to take on significant roles when they are older, they also draw huge crowds as family members flock to performances to see them.
“The minis are a major component of the musical,” says Den’ea Simone, executive stage manager for the teen summer musical. “They are a part of the musical that the audience members look for. It’s an incredible opportunity for them. I think that you are doing a disservice to the community as well as young people by eliminating those youth from the program.”
According to Hirsch, the removal of the minis from the program was because there was a lack of structure for the minis and the minis had a lot of downtime during rehearsals where they were sitting around without much to do.
“We want to revisit how best to provide a good musical theater experience for youth aged 8 to 12,” said Hirsch.
“We’ve seen that these younger kids need more attention from staff and need a more structured program,” she continued. “As such, we want to ensure that we’re providing what they need and that we have the budget, staffing and structures in place to serve this age group.
However, according to Simone, it is normal in theater productions for participants to “stand-by and wait your turn” during rehearsals because there are times when people practicing on set will have to go over a scene or dance routine over and over again until they perfect it.
“In theater there is a thing called hurry up and wait and because there could be a scene worked and re-worked, or there could be a dance being rehearsed over and over and over again,” said Simone. “In theater there is a lot of repetition, there really is, and so there are times where you can be standing by waiting on your turn. So, has that occurred? Absolutely. And it has happened with both the mains and the minis.
“But on a regular the children are not sitting idle not having anything to do,” continued Simone. “They sing songs, they have their music director. They have dance routines, they have a choreographer. They have their acting instructor, they have their director, there’s material for them to write and do poetry and they read their scripts, they are going over lines.”
“These are well rounded individuals that come to the theater and they commit their time to the whole summer to stay indoors and to rehearse lines and to become students of the theater,” added Simone.
In addition to the concerns over “downtime”, Parks has expressed concerns over the ratio of adult supervisors to kids, something that they say the musical has not conformed to in the past.
“Seattle Parks and Recreation’s standard supervisory ratio for younger kids is 1 adult to 10 kids—a supervisory ratio that we think we need to follow (and in past years have not followed) with the musical,” said Parks in a statement to The Medium. “For the musical, we want to ensure that we provide enough adults (which will require additional funding) for adequate oversight. We cannot overemphasize the importance of providing enough adult supervision to keep the younger kids engaged, interested, having a good time, and safe.”
According to sources close to the program, the proposal submitted for this year’s musical addressed the issue by reducing the ratio to the standard ratio followed by Parks.
Parks says that they want to have a conversation with the community about their vision of what the Teen Summer Musical should look like. However, for this summer, Parks is looking into “alternative activities to engage and provide important skills for interested kids aged 8 to 12” – including summer day-camps, which may have scholarships available for participants.
Simone believes that kids and their parent deserve more options for summer activities, not less.
“It seems like the African American kids just get sent to the community center,” says Simone. “That’s all that they can be exposed to? We’ve proven ourselves to be a good program that educates these kids in different ways.”
“One of the things that sets our program a part is that it is it is a community-based program,” added Simone. “The instructors are professional and the kids have the opportunity to get next level exposure by performing on a professional stage, in a professional venue with professionals who work in entertainment as their careers.”
While the overall fate of the program remains unclear, it does appear that for the time being that the program may have had its final curtain call at a major theatrical performance hall. Something that organizers feel is a vital part of building the self-esteem of program participants.
“It’s very disappointing, it really is,” said Simone. “We help these kids become really good entertainers, but we also help them become awesome professionals where they know how to stand up and be self-assured in front of people because they have these skills that they’ve learned. They feel so proud of themselves for getting out there in front of hundreds of people night after night performing what they have committed to the whole summer.”
“This program is very important to the community and the kids, and there are a lot of parents that look forward to having their kids in the program,” concluded Simone.
If the program does not continue to operate in its previous format, many parents will have to find an alternative to one of the best summer camp values in the area. In 2017, youth aged 8-12 paid $350 and youth aged 13-18 paid $275 to participate in the 9-week program. In addition, participants received a stipend of $150 per youth aged 8-12 and $599 per youth aged 13-18.
The Seattle Medium reached out to Acting Parks Superintendent Christopher Williams about the program but he did not respond to our request.
Update: The Seattle Parks Department (SPR) issued a press release after this story was published on Weds., Apr. 18, 2018 stating “this year’s production will now include 10 younger children, aged 8-12. To accommodate this change, SPR will add a staff member to the [Teen Summer Musical] program, which will allow the department to meet its standard supervisory ratio for young children of 1 adult to 10 kids.”
In addition, SPR announced that auditions for this year’s program “will occur at Rainier Beach Community Center on May 5 from 12 to 3 p.m. and on May 6 from 2 to 5 p.m. 2018 [Teen Summer Musical] performances will take place on August 24, 25, and 26. The venue for performances is yet to be determined as SPR continues to search for a high-quality location that suits the needs of the production.”
