20 U.S.C. § 954 — National Endowment for the Arts

(a) Establishment. The National Endowment for the Arts is established within the Foundation. (b) Chairperson. (1) The Endowment is headed by a Chairperson appointed by the President with Senate advice and consent. (2) The term is four years, and the Chairperson may be reappointed. These rules apply to a vacancy appointment. After the term ends, the Chairperson serves until a successor is appointed and qualified. (c) Arts assistance program. With advice from the National Council on the Arts, the Chairperson may make contracts, grants, or loans to arts groups and, when appropriate, exceptionally talented individuals. The assistance may support: (1) projects of major national or international artistic or cultural importance, emphasizing American creativity, cultural diversity, and professional excellence; (2) meritorious projects meeting professional, authentic, or traditional standards that citizens otherwise could not access for geographic or economic reasons; (3) projects helping artists distribute work, work in residence, or reach professional excellence; (4) projects of major artistic or cultural importance reaching or reflecting minority, inner-city, rural, or tribal communities; (5) projects increasing public knowledge, education, understanding, or appreciation of the arts; (6) arts-appreciation workshops; (7) local arts programs; (8) projects improving management and organization; (9) these kinds of projects through film, radio, video, or similar media to broaden access; and (10) related surveys, research, planning, and publications. A paragraph (10) publication may be supported without section 501 of title 44 only if the Chairperson consults the congressional Joint Committee on Printing and reports to the named Senate and House committees explaining the exemption. Loans must use terms approved by the Treasury Secretary. When choosing recipients, the Chairperson must give particular attention to artists and artistic groups traditionally underrepresented. (d) Applications. No payment may be made without an application filed under the Chairperson’s regulations and procedures. Those rules must use artistic excellence and merit as criteria, consider general decency and the diverse beliefs and values of the American public, and require consistency with this section’s purposes. They must state that obscenity has no artistic merit, is not protected speech, and may not be funded. Obscene projects, productions, workshops, and programs may not receive assistance under this subchapter. Approval or denial does not itself mean or prove that a project is obscene or not obscene. (e) Group-grant limit. A grant to a group generally may not exceed 50 percent of project or production cost. Up to 20 percent of the Endowment’s fiscal-year funds for (c) may be used without that limit. (f) Eligibility. A group must receive assistance only if no net earnings benefit private stockholders or individuals and its donations qualify as charitable contributions under section 170(c) of title 26. (g) State grants. (1) With Council advice, the Chairperson may assist States with existing and new arts projects meeting (c)’s standards, to provide adequate arts programs, facilities, and services to all people and communities. (2) A State must apply when required and submit a plan that: (A) designates or establishes one State agency as sole administrator; (B) limits State funds to agency-approved projects serving (c)’s objectives; (C) requires reports, including progress toward plan goals; (D) assures public meetings after reasonable notice and gives the meeting recommendations and the agency’s response; and (E) describes recent participation by artists and arts organizations, availability to all State people and communities, and projects widening participation or access. No application may be approved without a compliant plan. (3) Each approved-plan State receives at least $200,000; if funds are insufficient, States share equally. Excess up to 25 percent of available funds is reserved for the Chairperson’s grants to States and regional groups; remaining excess is divided equally among approved-plan States, but no State receives less than $200,000. (4)(A) An allotment may normally pay no more than 50 percent of a project. An allotment over $125,000 may, at the Chairperson’s discretion, pay up to all of a project otherwise unavailable to State residents, but the exempt amount cannot exceed 20 percent of the allotment. The Chairperson must consider the State’s circumstances and not exercise this discretion forever for that State. (B) A first-sentence allotment not obligated 60 days before fiscal year end may fund regional groups. (C) Funds may not replace non-Federal funds; the State’s required share must be directly controlled and appropriated by the State and managed by its agency. (D) “Regional group” means any multistate group, whether or not the States touch. (E) For (3)(B), “State” also includes only the listed special jurisdictions with populations of at least 200,000 under the latest census. (5) Unused State allotments become available to the Endowment for (c) at year end. (h) Suspension. After notice and a hearing, if a group substantially fails to follow this section, a State agency substantially fails its plan, or funds are diverted, the Chairperson must notify the Treasury Secretary and stop further grants until the failure or diversion is fixed, or repayment is made or arranged if fixing is impossible. (i) Application contents. An applicant must provide a detailed project description, timetable, assurance of interim reports on progress and compliance, annual reports for projects lasting over one year, and a final report within 90 days after the assistance period or project completion, whichever comes first. The applicant must also assure artistic excellence and merit. (j) Installments. Regulations must generally distribute assistance in installments. No more than two-thirds may be paid when approved; the rest waits until substantial compliance with this section and the assistance conditions is found. (k) Reviews. The Inspector General must review recipients for compliance, including accounting and financial rules. (l) Obscene use. After notice and a record hearing, if assistance was used for a project determined obscene, the Chairperson must bar later assistance until the recipient repays the amount and under the terms the Chairperson sets. Repayment goes to the Treasury as miscellaneous receipts. This rule does not apply to assistance provided before it took effect or to a project more than seven years after the latest assistance. (m) Professional labor. A grant recipient must assure the Labor Secretary that professional performers and supporting personnel will receive at least the prevailing minimum compensation, without later deduction or rebate, and that work will not occur under unsanitary, hazardous, or dangerous conditions. State safety and sanitation compliance is initial evidence of compliance. The Labor Secretary may issue standards and procedures. (n) Laborers and mechanics. Recipients must assure the Labor Secretary that construction laborers and mechanics receive prevailing local wages under the listed title 40 sections. The Labor Secretary has the related powers in Reorganization Plan 14 of 1950 and section 3145 of title 40. (o) Coordination. The Chairperson must coordinate Endowment programs with Federal, public, and private programs and consider other agencies’ contributions. The Chairperson may make reimbursable or nonreimbursable interagency agreements and use authorized (c) funds for those activities. (p) Quality-strengthening program. With Council advice, the Chairperson may contract with or grant to public agencies and private nonprofits nationally, statewide, or locally to: (1)(A) increase continuing support and contributors; (B) improve administration, management, and long-term financial planning; (C) increase audiences’ participation and appreciation; (D) support State-agency cooperation with local groups, including community residencies, rural development, technical-assistance models, touring models, and professional staffing and financial stability; (E) increase cooperation among organizations serving their communities; (F) involve citizens in cultural planning; and (G) encourage activity reflecting the Nation’s varied traditions. (2) The Chairperson may also grant to States for developing arts organizations’ artistic, program, staff, management, financial-system, and long-term-planning abilities, and for increasing arts activity and access in rural, inner-city, and other underserved areas. Priority goes to development activities, and an applicant may receive this paragraph’s development assistance in no more than three fiscal years. (3) A payment may not exceed 50 percent of program or project cost. (4) The Chairperson has the authority given by (c) and section 959. (q) Information system. In continuing consultation with State and local agencies, organizations, and Federal agencies, the Chairperson must develop and operate a practical national system to collect and publicly share information about the arts, artists, groups, and audiences. It must cover artistic and financial trends, audience participation, arts education, and access including rural communities. Using it and State-plan data, the Chairperson must make periodic reports on the Nation’s arts, including access to Endowment programs and participation by emerging, rural, and culturally diverse artists, organizations, and communities. Reports go to the President and Congress and to the States, first by October 1, 1992, and every four years after that.