What questions do you have about the 2026 elections? What major issues do you want candidates to address? Let us know.
On Election Day, Nov. 3, Philadelphians will vote on a possible change to the city’s charter that would establish an office of arts and culture, to be called Creative Philadelphia.
Wait … Doesn’t the city already have one of those?
Yes and no.
In 1986, the city established such an office under then-Mayor Wilson Goode. The office has since gone through name changes, expanding and contracting with the waxing and waning of the city budget.
But the office’s existence has always relied on an executive order from the sitting mayor, which has made it vulnerable to being overhauled or eliminated at any time.
Years after Goode’s administration, Mayor John Street shuttered the office. His successor, Mayor Michael Nutter, re-established it with a different name. Nutter’s successor, Mayor Jim Kenney, proposed eliminating the office under budget pressure in 2020. Instead, he reduced its capacity and moved it under the Managing Director’s Office.
Mayor Cherelle Parker made directorship of the arts and culture office a cabinet position, meaning that person would have a seat at the mayor’s table. That person is Valerie Gay, who renamed the office Creative Philadelphia.
But Parker never promised to make the office permanent, as that is beyond the power of the mayor’s office.
