Lubbock Mayor Mark McBrayer is asking for the community to give the Lubbock City Council some time to work through the grant funding issue they cut from First Friday Art Trail earlier in the week.

On Tuesday, the Lubbock City Council voted 5-2 to strip $30,000 in grant money from Civic Lubbock to First Friday Art Trail over a drag show that the City Council said happened in June. The amendment to strip the funding was offered by Councilman David Glasheen and Mayor Mark McBrayer spoke in favor of cutting funding over content that he said was of "sexual nature". Glasheen had also pointed to a program during First Friday Art Trail called "Queering West Texas, a child-friendly LGBT workshop".

Read More: Lubbock City Council Cuts Funding To First Friday Art Trail Over Drag Show Event

On Friday afternoon, Lubbock Mayor Mark McBrayer issued a press release that makes it sound as though he has been presented with new information after hearing from LHUCA and the First Friday Art Trail. And that new information could lead to funding being restored.

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Below is the Mayor's press release.

Mayor McBrayer Releases Statement Regarding Tuesday's City Council Vote

Mayor Mark McBrayer shared a statement regarding the vote to not award grant funding for the First Friday Art Trail:

“Thank you all for taking the time to express your concern over the City Council’s vote to not provide a grant to the Louise Hopkins Underwood Center for the Arts (LHUCA) for the First Friday Art Trail (FFAT) this upcoming year. As you may be aware, the City of Lubbock, through the auspices of Civic Lubbock, Inc.’s (CLI) Cultural Arts Grant Awards program, supports approximately 30 different events annually in Lubbock. The money for these grants come from the Hotel Occupancy Tax (HOT tax) the city collects on each hotel stay. So, it is a tax-payer funded program, and the City Council is responsible for approving each grant.

“I appreciate your commitment and enthusiasm towards LHUCA. I, like you, enjoy the FFAT and generally think it is worthy of support from our HOT tax. Importantly, not every cultural arts event that applies for the grant gets awarded, nor could the grant program provide substantial funds to all the events that happen within the city. Not all requests get funded for the full amount of the request, either. Choices regarding worthy recipients must be made.  CLI conducts the initial review and then presents their recommendations to the City Council for final approval.

“A common concern that many of you shared in your phone calls and email was that CLI and LHUCA were not made aware in advance that the vote to defund would occur and were not provided an opportunity to respond with additional information and specifics regarding LHUCA’s request and CLI’s recommendation.  City Staff and I have since reached out to representatives of CLI and LHUCA to allow them to respond, and they have done so by providing additional facts and specificity, which I believe may have impacted the Council’s analysis.  Although I cannot speak for anyone else on the City Council, with the additional information received, I’m hopeful we will come to an arrangement regarding funding the grant with LHUCA and FFAT for the coming year.

“With that, I simply ask that you give the City Council an opportunity to work through this in a way that provides support for the arts in Lubbock in a manner that is beneficial for our entire community.

“I appreciate your phone calls and emails. As always, please do not hesitate to reach out to me on any item that is of concern to you.”

At this time, no other member of the Lubbock City Council has spoken about the new information given to the Lubbock City Council. While the grant money hasn't been restored, it sounds as though the Mayor of Lubbock is working towards that.

The next First Friday Art Trail is Friday, August 2nd.

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