West Virginia Department of Education and the Arts representatives took umbrage Thursday over a recent report that declared state funding for the arts is wasteful.
"It's not just arts. It's who we are and what we are," Culture and History Commissioner Randall Reid-Smith said of the "Wild and Wasteful West Virginia" study.
"I don't really want to talk about it, because I don't want to give credence to it," he told the Senate Finance Committee on Thursday.
Produced by the Koch brothers-backed Taxpayers Protection Alliance and state partner, the Cardinal Institute for West Virginia Policy, the 54-page report compiled what it identified as $330 million of wasteful spending by 60 state agencies.
Among its targets were $2.9 million appropriated for West Virginia fairs and festivals, state funding for West Virginia Public Broadcasting, along with a variety of arts grants, funding for museums and historical sites, and the state Humanities Council.
"Obviously, there's some people out there that think the state should not be doing these things - good things, but they should be funded by the private sector," Senate Finance Chairman Mike Hall, R-Putnam, said summarizing the report.
Reid-Smith said many of the report's findings were incorrect, including an assertion that Goldenseal magazine is deeply in debt. He said Goldenseal, in fact, is self-sufficient.
He also noted that funding for fairs and festivals is appropriated by the Legislature in the budget bill, which sometimes raises questions about why certain events receive disproportionate funding.
"They're determined by you. We're just the keepers of it," Reid-Smith said.
However, he added, "Fairs and festivals are one of the best investments you can put into your communities."
Hall noted that seems to be the case with the Mothman Festival in his district.
"It absolutely stuns me that we have 5,000 [to] 10,000 people coming from everywhere in the world for that," he said.
Likewise, WVPB Executive Director Scott Finn said the arts are a key to promoting economic development.
"Look around the United States. Look at the successful cities, the places where people want to live, the places that are growing," he said. "They all have strong arts components."
Reach Phil Kabler at philk@wvgazettemail.com, 304 348-1220, or follow @PhilKabler on Twitter.