{"id":106339,"date":"2016-03-08T19:05:02","date_gmt":"2016-03-09T02:05:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mancos-creative-district-prepares-for-independence\/"},"modified":"2016-03-08T19:05:02","modified_gmt":"2016-03-09T02:05:02","slug":"mancos-creative-district-prepares-for-independence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mancos-creative-district-prepares-for-independence\/","title":{"rendered":"Mancos Creative District prepares for independence"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Steve
Steve Williams works at the forge. Williams is one of the instructors at the Mancos School of the West, which is planning for its second season. The school is a spin-off of the Mancos Creative District, which will end its candidacy period in June.<\/span>The Journal file photo<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

While working toward creative district designation, a group of volunteers has founded the Mancos School of the West, the Fall Harvest Festival and brought in $26,700 in grant funds.<\/p>\n

Now the Mancos Creative District is looking to graduate from a steering committee to its own board and bring more artist space to town, said Rena Wilson, a member of the steering committee.<\/p>\n

Recently, the group was informed that its letter of intent was accepted, and it was invited to apply for state program that could help revamp a building to turn it into housing and studio space for artists, Wilson said.<\/p>\n

This could help meet a need for housing in the community.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s really a lack of rentals in Mancos,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The community could receive $35,000 for a feasibility study and arts market survey. But it would have to matched dollar for dollar, according to town documents.<\/p>\n

The group also has a grant pending to fund a mural on the west side of the Visitor Center, said Town Manager Andrea Phillips.<\/p>\n

With many efforts underway, in June the Mancos Creative District will come to the end of its two-year candidacy with Colorado Creative Industries.<\/p>\n

Forming a board will help the group become more independent from the town, which has been its fiscal agent.<\/p>\n

The group is leaning toward a five-person executive board and a larger advisory committee, Phillips said.<\/p>\n

The group plans to apply to be a board under Mancos Valley Resources, an umbrella nonprofit that serves many organizations in the area.<\/p>\n

The group also wants to hire an employee, Wilson said.<\/p>\n

The Mancos School of the West, a spin-off from the creative district, also plans to expand.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe feel it did really well in its first year,\u201d Wilson said.<\/p>\n

This year, the school will host artists from Oregon, Santa Fe and New York.<\/p>\n

It is also open to artists from Cortez and Durango hosting classes this year, Wilson said.<\/p>\n

mshinn@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

District seeks funds for artist housing and mural project<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":106340,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[83,1472],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-106339","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-mancos","tag-painting"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106339","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106339"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106339\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/106340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106339"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=106339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}