The "A" in STEAM: Does this community embrace, celebrate & support all the arts?

A side-by-side of nine cities — including all three Arizona metros — measuring institutional supply and grassroots heritage, then pairing arts vitality against community health. Re-weight the index yourself to see how the story changes.

SocialMentalPhysicalEnvironmental Education & Resource category

💡 The hypothesis: communities that embrace and celebrate the arts in all formats are healthier — physically, economically, and socially. This dashboard is the instrument to test it.

Composite Index

Arts Vitality at a glance — re-weight it live

There is no single "right" weighting. Drag the sliders to value institutional funding vs. grassroots heritage differently and watch the cities re-rank. This is the core insight: Tucson looks weak on funding, strong on heritage — what you reward decides who wins.

Weight the five drivers

National vibrancy (SMU rank) 20%

SMU DataArts 2025 Top-100 standing

Public arts funding / capita 20%

State appropriation per resident (NASAA FY25)

Creative economy (% of GDP) 20%

Arts & cultural share of GDP (BEA ACPSA '23)

Local investment mechanism 20%

Strength of dedicated local funding

Heritage & grassroots identity 20%

UNESCO, festivals, murals, cultural districts

The Side-by-Side

Nine cities, every domain — verified data

Note the funding mechanisms differ (city department vs. county grant vs. dedicated tax), so don't read the raw dollars as a clean ranking — read each cell with its mechanism. State-level rows (funding/capita, GDP%, jobs) are identical within a state — so the three Arizona metros share them, and only the local rows below diverge.

Domain	New York City	Chicago	San Francisco	Los Angeles	New Orleans	Salt Lake City	Phoenix	Tucson	Flagstaff
SMU Arts Vibrancy (2025, Top 100)	#3	#26	#2	#12	#16	#48	NRnot in Top 100	#99	NRnot in Top 100
State arts $ / capita (NASAA FY25)	$5.29 #5 nationally	$2.05 #14 · IL	$0.96 #32 · CA	$0.96 #32 · CA	$0.48 #43 · LA	$2.98 #10 · UT	$0.27 #48 · AZ	$0.27 #48 · AZ	$0.27 #48 · AZ
Arts & culture share of GDP (BEA '23)	7.6%	3.0%	7.5%	7.5%	2.1%	3.4%	3.0%	3.0%	3.0%
Arts & cultural jobs (state, BEA '23)	482,543	226,407	821,183	821,183	48,591	69,047	95,294	95,294	95,294
Local arts funding (latest)	~$254M dept / $59.3M grantsNYC DCLA — largest US municipal funder	~$73M dept / ~$8M grantsChicago DCASE — hotel/special-events	~$15M/yrSFAC + Grants for the Arts — dedicated hotel tax (Prop E)	$5.59M grantsLA County Dept of Arts & Culture	City-funded — paused2025 budget crisis; grants halted	$26M to 244 orgsSalt Lake County ZAP dedicated tax	~$1.7M grantsPhoenix Office of Arts & Culture — percent-for-art	~$0.8M/yr ($635K FY24)Arts Foundation for Tucson & S. AZ	~$125K project poolCreative Flagstaff — BBB dedicated tax
UNESCO Creative City	—	—	—	—	Music	—	—	Gastronomy · 1st in US	—
Heritage signature	Broadway, Lincoln Ctr, world museums	Art Institute, CSO/Lyric, Second City, blues & jazz, Cloud Gate	SFMOMA, de Young, Opera/Ballet/Symphony, Mission murals	Film/TV capital, Chicano muralism	Jazz Fest, Mardi Gras, ~24 cultural districts	Sundance (departing '26), Ballet West, Utah Symphony	Heard Museum (Native art), Roosevelt Row, First Fridays	All Souls Procession, murals, mariachi, Indigenous/Latino	Museum of N. Arizona, Lowell Observatory, 1st Dark Sky City

Tell the Full Story

Factors to add beyond the obvious

Supply (venues, programs, events) is only half the picture. To be credible to funders, layer in these:

Arts philanthropy you can actually track — IRS 990 / NCCS data + Candid capture foundation & contributed revenue to every arts 501(c)(3). This directly answers "can we track donations to arts & music orgs."
Creative-economy jobs & wages — BEA ACPSA gives state-level arts employment & compensation (already in the matrix above).
Participation, not just supply — NEA's Survey of Public Participation in the Arts: are people attending and making art, or do venues just exist?
Arts-education access & equity — Arts Education Data Project: % of schools with certified arts teachers, and access by income/Title I — not just whether programs exist.

Arts-in-health programs — hospitals with artist-in-residence / music therapy. The literal bridge from "A" to PHIT; belongs on the dashboard.
Public-art mechanisms — Percent-for-Art ordinances & state-designated cultural districts (NASAA tracks both).
Per-capita & per-acre normalization — your mural-density instinct, applied to venues, events, and jobs so small cities aren't penalized.
Equity distribution index — how arts access spreads across neighborhoods, not just the citywide total.

The Test, Part 2

How to actually prove "arts-rich = healthier"

The evidence base is on your side: the WHO's 2019 review (Fancourt & Finn) synthesized 3,000+ studies finding the arts play a major role in preventing illness, promoting health, and treatment across the lifespan. Here's how to test it on your own data.

STEP 1 · UNIT

Go to the county level

Run all ~3,100 U.S. counties (or metros/CBSAs) so you have statistical power, not 5 anecdotes.

STEP 2 · INDEX

Build the Arts Vitality Index

Composite z-score across the domains above (SMU indicators + ACPSA + NASAA + NCCS nonprofit density + arts-ed access + mural/venue/event counts) — all per-capita / per-acre normalized.

STEP 3 · OUTCOMES

Pull matched public outcomes

Health: County Health Rankings + CDC PLACES. Economic: BEA GDP, median income, unemployment. Social: social-association rate, volunteering, belonging — the Social-lens metrics already in PHIT.

STEP 4 · MODEL

Control for the confounders

Correlate, then run multiple regression controlling for income, education, age, race composition & population density — because arts participation tracks with income/education, which track with health. Report the partial correlation after controls. Add peer-matched comparisons (match counties on income + size, then compare arts-high vs arts-low).

STEP 5 · HONESTY

Association ≠ causation

This proves association. For causation you'd need longitudinal data — does a community's arts investment predict later health gains? That's a strong follow-on grant narrative.

PHIT FIT

Where it lives

Every Arts panel carries: Lens = Social, Category = Education & Resource, Source = NEA/BEA/NASAA/SMU DataArts/NCCS/CHR, Coach = Coach Lucy — inheriting your tiered-access & ?view=arts instance architecture.