Federal and local relief funds will bring an “injection of capital and hope,” arts advocates say. But the money won’t be able to save all of D.C.’s struggling venues.

ArtsAction D.C. aims to be a “collective voice to advocate for funding of arts in the District.”

In its fiscal 2013 budget introduced yesterday, the D.C. Council increased the amount allocated to the District’s Commission on the Arts and Humanities by $6.8 million, pushing funding for that agency to its highest level since 2009.

After being chipped away at for the past few years, the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities is getting a bump in Mayor Vince Gray’s budget for the 2013 fiscal year to as much as $7.6 million.

Looking at President Obama’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2013, it appears the White House is still trying to turn a small, but vital arts grant program over to District control, but the lack of specifics isn’t promising.

It was a rough year for government support of the arts in 2011. Federal and local governments scaled back their funding, in some cases forcing cultural institutions to make significant programming cuts.

The Torpedo Factory in Alexandria is one of hundreds of arts organizations that could see their funding slashed under a bill passed by the Virginia House of Delegates. Photo by clarissa.stark Some potentially bad news for local arts crept under our radar at the end of February. The Virginia House of Delegates passed a budget proposal that includes a 50 percent cut to funding for the Commission for the Arts next year, and the…

Mike Daisey gets all worked up in “How Theater Failed America.” Photo by Kenneth Aaron. Mike Daisey doesn’t much care for How Theater Failed America as a title, but it’s more compelling, if less accurate, than How Theater Saved Mike Daisey. Which is presumably why Daisey, world-class raconteur that he is, answers the question of the title, more or less, in the very first scene and then moves on to the good stuff. Though…