From BTMFBA to "community right to buy"

 BTMFBA, or Buy The Mother F------ Building Already, is a set of blog entries about how arts groups specifically and nonprofits more generally, need to own their facilities in order to be able to control their futures.

-- "BTMFBA: the best way to ward off artist or retail displacement is to buy the building," 2016

-- "BTMFBA: maintaining arts spaces in the face of rising real estate values | Seattle, New York City," 2024
-- "New form of BTMFBA in San Francisco," 2023
-- "A wrinkle on BTMFBA: let the city/county own the cultural facility, while you operate it (San Francisco and the Fillmore Heritage Center)," 2021
-- "BTMFBA: Baltimore and the Area 405 Studio," 2021
-- "Revisiting stories: cultural planning and the need for arts-based community development corporations as real estate operators," 2018
-- "BMFBTA revisited: nonprofits and facilities planning and acquisition," 2016
-- "BTMFBA: artists and Los Angeles," 2017
-- "BTMFBA Chronicles: Seattle coffee shop raises money to buy its building," 2018
-- "Dateline Los Angeles: BTMFBA & Transformational Projects Action Planning & arts-related community development corporation as an implementation mechanism to own property," 2018

although sometimes nonprofits can't be trusted either.

-- "Lack of a system breeds more of the same: Source Theater, Washington DC, up for sale 2006, 2024," 2024
-- "When BTMFBA isn't enough: keeping civic assets public through cy pres review," 2016

‘David Cameron’s talk of a volunteer-led “big society” became a cover story for funding cuts and the closure of leisure facilities.’ Photograph: David Rowe/Alamy

Under Conservative control of the UK from 2010-2024, local governments were severely crushed by actions of the central government, austerity and other cuts, and further mandates meant that local governments faced up to a 2/3 drop in revenues.

Many local governments have gone bankrupt and are blamed for lack of probity and good management, when really it is a mark of system failure.

Many shut down facilities like libraries and recreation centers ("Councils reduce library and culture spend by almost £500m since 2010, new analysis shows," CCN), and got involved in bad real estate deals to try to earn revenue ("Councils’ disastrous journey into commercial property investments," LandlordZone).  From the article:

English councils collectively went on a near £7bn commercial property buying spree, a journey which has now proved to be responsible for bringing some of them to the edge of bankruptcy. Their commercial investments, often made at huge distances from their boroughs over the last eight years or so, involved the purchase of office and industrial buildings, shopping centres, cinemas and even solar farms. 

 And despite their impressive looking multi-page strategy documents justifying their investment cases, many of which are still available on these council’s websites, the edifice eventually came tumbling down. In the case of many of these councils it has led to budget cuts to many services, redundancies, fire sales of council properties and an appeal to central government for bailouts.

The Labor government has introduced a proposal giving communities the right of first refusal on properties up for sale, to pursue community/public good/social infrastructure goals ("The Guardian view on a ‘community right to buy’: unleashing the power of the local," Guardian).  From the article:

In theory, the bill will give communities a head start over private investors in bidding to save, run and, in some cases, repurpose valued buildings and assets. As the local government minister, Jim McMahon, told the House of Commons last week: “When we talk about important community assets, we see from an economic point of view that it is far better for them to be used and be productive, but … we also recognise that they are hugely important to community identity and pride.” 

That is an insight to be built on by a government that, while understandably prioritising growth, sometimes tends to an overly technocratic understanding of its mandate for change. The new “right to buy” legislation can help shift the balance of power in less well-off areas, where local development has too often meant more betting shops or fast food outlets. But Labour’s overall communities strategy needs to be considerably fleshed out if its impact is to be transformative.

In places that have suffered from underinvestment and a sense of disconnection from power for decades, the white paper’s aspiration to boost local engagement and “community voice” will only be fulfilled through a long-term injection of major funding and support. In a recent report [Fixing the foundations: A communities strategy for Britain], the Power To Change thinktank recommends the creation of a community growth network, dedicated to building up organisational capacity and confidence in areas where the social fabric has been steadily eroded.

Now you could argue that other attempts by local councils to own properties, or mis-management or failure to keep control of buildings in a nonprofit portfolio doesn't bode well for this policy.

The failure of ArtScape in Toronto ("Artscape tried to launch a ‘game changer’ for artists. Now it’s on the brink of collapse," Toronto Globe & Mail) is another illustration that arts groups buying properties with the expectation of major revenue generation are likely to fail.

I think the issue here is the focus on maintaining and extending social infrastructure rather than revenue generation and that this new policy is workable.  And how Power to Change recommends capacity building is an important add on to better enable success.