From Old Town to Spartanopolis

Like the fabled realm of Asgard in Marvel’s “Thor” franchise, the Arts Council of Greater Lansing is about people, not a place.

Meghan Martin, the council’s executive director, had to unroll a 7-foot-tall logo and plunk it next to her new third-floor office in East Lansing last week to pose for the photo on this page so that readers would know whose space this is and what this story is about.

There are several layers of significance to the council’s April 1 move from its former office on Turner Street in Old Town to the cutting-edge Coworkerie in Michigan State University Federal Credit Union’s downtown East Lansing office complex on Abbot Road.

Moving from a street-level storefront tucked into the 19th-century brickwork of Old Town to a high-concept, high-rise workspace perched above the mushrooming 21st-century Spartanopolis of East Lansing is a big change in itself.

But it’s only a response to the bigger changes overtaking the nonprofit world — arts nonprofits in particular.

Martin wants the council to stay lean and flexible as it works to promote and support the arts, largely behind the scenes, in Clinton, Eaton and Ingham counties.

It’s more crucial than ever for the council to wring all it can out from a modest endowment fund, private and corporate donations, member dues and occasional consulting fees.

“Right now, you see that funding can be completely torn out of your budget by the different things happening in our society and our government,” Martin said. “You have to diversify your funding sources, especially looking at the landscape of things right now.”

For the council, that means reaching out to the community, doing more work outside the office and keeping operating costs at a minimum.

The former space in Old Town’s Lowertown Lofts was going largely unused, especially after the pandemic pivot toward working from home.

“They were great landlords, and the space was fantastic pre-pandemic when we were going into the office every day and having more meetings in person,” Martin said. “It was just more than we needed.”

So far, the council is the only permanent occupant of the 8,000-square-foot Coworkerie, with two office spaces for Martin and membership and program manager Taylor Haslett. Martin’s five-person staff (four full-timers and a part-time graphic designer) do most of their work from home.

“This is a lot less expensive,” Martin said. “There’s a lot of things we no longer have to pay for, like these desks, these monitors.”

The rest of the third floor is a showpiece of 21st-century workspace design. Single-person work bubbles, just big enough for a person and a laptop, look like props from a sci-fi movie. An impressive array of modular, state-of-the-art workstations and sleek conference rooms stretch in all directions.

Informal meeting rooms offer spectacular views of the burgeoning East Lansing skyline to the east and the stately Peoples Church, with its flowery courtyard and Valley Court Park beyond, to the west. There’s a communal kitchen and a wellness center with private rooms for breastfeeding.

The council looked at several spaces when it decided to move, but Martin said this was an obvious fit. MSUFCU is a donor and supporter of the council’s Young Creatives program. The council has consulted with the credit union on several projects, including the credit union’s annual student art show. Ami Iceman Haueter, the credit union’s chief experience officer, also serves as president of the Arts Council’s board of directors.

With all that in mind, Martin said the council is happy to serve as a “guinea pig” in an experimental space.

“It’s the first time they’ve done anything like this,” she said. “We’ve been a longtime partner, and we’re new to this as well, so we get to figure all this out together.”

The move to a coworking space also suits a recent shift in the council’s operational style from a hub where artists and nonprofits go for help to a moveable feast that comes to them. That roll-up logo has put on quite a few miles in the past two years as the council works to make arts grants and other forms of support more accessible to communities throughout the tri-county area, including rural areas.

As program manager, Haslett started an ongoing series of casual “grant chats” that bring the council to coffee shops and other informal spots, not only in Lansing but in DeWitt, St. Johns, Charlotte, Williamston and other areas. The council also hosts “creative mixers” where artists and members of the public can meet and mingle in a variety of spaces, from the Cedar Street Art Collective to a dance studio in DeWitt Township. (The next mixer is 6 to 8 p.m. Tuesday (April 22) at EagleMonk Pub and Brewery on West Mount Hope Highway in Lansing.)

Martin said the most common misconception about the council is that it’s a government agency.

“We’re a nonprofit,” she declared. “Our finances come from our own endowments and a 60-year history of building up a diverse portfolio, plus private donations.”

The fund is modest, but it enables the council to run several grant projects that support dozens of local artists each year. The council also administers bigger arts grants funded by the city of Lansing and Ingham County.

This year, the council is joining 25 other local nonprofits in the Capital Area Community Foundation’s 35 Hours of Giving, a massive fundraiser running May 7 through 8. (People can donate at the event website, 35hours.ourcommunity.org.) The inaugural event in 2023 raised $251,680, helping 15 nonprofits strengthen their endowment funds.

Despite the push to diversify the council’s income sources, cuts in federal funding are affecting some council-administered project grants through the National Endowment for the Arts, including the annual Creative Placemaking Summit.

“Fortunately, it’s not a large component of our day-to-day operational funds, but it’s obviously concerning,” Martin said.

Not all changes in the local arts scene are for the good of those organizations. On April 3, two days after moving to the new co-working space, Martin represented the council at the closing reception of the Lansing Art Gallery, another 60-year-old arts institution.

“When something like that happens, there’s a ripple effect in the community,” Martin said. “People are scared to donate. I hope people are alarmed when a longstanding organization like that folds.”

Meeting with grieving gallery supporters, Martin resolved to redouble the nonprofit’s efforts to promote and support the arts in mid-Michigan with help from the community.

“We hope that those who can give will,” she said. “We don’t want to lose any more arts organizations.”