June 24, 2021
To the We See You White American Theater Steering Committee,
We have heard your loud and clear call for accountability, transparency, and action. We recognize the labor behind the document of demands released on July 8, 2020, and your ongoing advocacy. Thank you for your generosity and your commitment to the American theatre.
Since the release of the demands, members of OSF leadership, staff, and board have engaged in an imperfect but thoughtful process within departments and workgroups to push for change within our organization.
This statement, which outlines our approach and lists our initial commitments toward becoming an anti-racist organization actively working to eliminate anti-Blackness, is intended to be the first of many. Moving forward, we will inform the public of our progress on current commitments and future structural and policy changes on our website at least twice a year.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS:
OSF has been going through a profound leadership transition in 2020 at the executive and senior staff levels, in addition to facing the COVID-19 pandemic and the Almeda Fire in the Rogue Valley. These realities impacted our process of writing a response to the demands in 2020. In 2021, we will be facing more leadership transitions, including in the area of Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility (IDEA). But with our new Artistic and Executive Leaders now in place, we are committed to creating a more robust internal process to create a substantial response and plan for the future.
We acknowledge that it is current and former Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color (BIPOC) staff members, led by Black and Brown women, who have advanced this work within the organization to date. All progress made in the future is built upon their labor and dedication to this work. In fact, our whole field owes them a tremendous debt, and a generation of BIPOC leadership will continue to benefit from the legacy of their contributions.
We acknowledge that a number of the WeSeeYouWAT demands are in response to experiences of BIPOC artists and staff at predominantly and historically white theatres, including at OSF. We have done harm. There are hundreds of current and former OSF staff and artists who have put their bodies, souls, and careers in harm’s way to push OSF to become anti-racist. Therefore, all future work must focus on not creating further harm.
We acknowledge that there is a lack of trust between our staff and Board, as well as between our artists and leadership. This lack of trust is caused by significant past harm and frequent failures to deliver on promises. The OSF Board specifically acknowledges that there has been little accountability for past, racist Board behaviors. Accountability structures are beginning to develop with specific action items included below.
We acknowledge that OSF has allowed harmful behavior from our audiences toward our artists and toward other audience members from marginalized communities. We must reset our relationship with our patrons based on our stated values, and recommit to creating spaces where policing of behavior, harmful stereotyping, and entitlement are stopped and addressed in the moment.
We acknowledge that OSF is deeply imperfect despite having been celebrated as a leader in this work. Many changes at OSF were rooted in the work of individuals and did not always result in systemic change. We must focus our future efforts on resetting the ecology.
A WORD ON OUR APPROACH:
OSF is a space for artists. That is the only reason we exist. We must create spaces for the artists to do their best work, which begins by removing conditions that are harmful. The work of anti-racism is not separate from our mission and must be part of the day-to-day work of artmaking.
We’re a non-profit organization. All of our artistic programming, community engagement, and administrative processes must be rooted in Service. That is our mission, and it must be central in the way we make change in our processes and programming.
Dismantling racist systems requires building anti-racist systems where there is no tolerance for racist acts. We’re not here to change hearts and minds. We create change by creating consequence to racist behavior.
Our work focuses on calling people in and holding them accountable, while dismantling the white supremacist structures. Requiring accountability cannot succeed unless it is supported by guidance, training, and tools to make change.
These complicated and nuanced issues require complicated and nuanced conversation, but as an organization, we must address problems and talk about solutions in simple and direct terms. We will not use grandstanding language to overstate our successes or disguise our failures.
We will focus on doing the work, and not publicizing the work to get recognized. Our goal is to intentionally and specifically change OSF to serve all of our constituents better, and to provide an action-based example for other organizations of our size to do the same.
The fact that we have a significant number of BIPOC senior staff members, including our Artistic Director, does not release us from responsibility. We must hold all leadership accountable and change the underlying structures to mitigate harm.
In as many areas as possible, we must do better than what the demands require. And if a certain demand does not apply to OSF’s unique structure and repertory schedule, we must analyze the underlying problem addressed, and create a unique solution for our organization.
DEMANDS THAT OSF HAS MET AND CONTINUES TO MANAGE:
Although there are many items on this list, we acknowledge that most changes named below have happened in the last 10 years of an 85-year organization.
- Budget line for IDEA work: We acknowledge that the budget has not been sufficient for the full scope of changes we want to make. We intend to increase resources to support our vision for this work.
- Mandatory ED&I training for full-time staff: artEquity has provided trainings for staff for the past 4 years.
- Established affinity groups that are encouraged and supported. Support from OSF includes providing physical space, paid time during the workday, and financial support for hosting meetings, as well as budget provided for producing public and private events and a paid local annual retreat day for BIPOC staff and in-town artists.
- No Mainstage/Second Stage construct in pay schedules.
- Key Stylist with expertise in textured hair: This is especially important as textured hair care is non-existent in Southern Oregon. (Currently laid off due to COVID.)
- Intimacy director for every show: OSF hired the country’s first Resident Intimacy Director. (Currently laid off due to COVID.)
- Acknowledgment of Indigenous Community: OSF has included acknowledgment of the Indigenous heritage of Rogue Valley before all public performances and presentations. In the past, the creation of the acknowledgment language did not engage local Native leaders and, as a result, caused harm. We have engaged local community members to remedy this, and commit to also including acknowledgments in larger internal meetings like Company Calls, first rehearsals, and Board meetings.
- OSF has consistent, meaningful, and long-term relationships with BIPOC artists, and has made significant progress on BIPOC representation in all artistic and production disciplines:
- Majority of writers and directors identify as BIPOC (45% in 2019 and 70% in 2020).
- Majority of designers identify as BIPOC (57% in 2019 and 54% in 2020).
- OSF’s commitment to inclusive casting over the last decade has resulted in an Acting Company that is majority BIPOC identified (55.7% in 2019 and 57.1% in 2020).
- 31 of 39 currently commissioned writers identify as BIPOC (79%).
- Literary department is majority BIPOC identified (60%).
- Producing Department is majority BIPOC identified (80%).
- Although there has been progress in recent years, Production Staff are not majority BIPOC identified (7% in 2015 and 19% in 2020).
- As of March 4, 2021, 40% of the members of our Board of Directors identify as BIPOC, up from 30% in 2020. Additionally, five out of nine members of the Board Executive Committee, including the Board President, identify as BIPOC.
- In 2013, the Board created an Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion task force, which became a standing committee of the Board in 2015. It is now a key strategic pillar supported by teams of Board members. A co-chair of the Board IDEA strategic pillar is a member of the Board Executive Committee.
- OSF does not require a minimum Board member financial contribution to join its Board.
- Members for Equity (a trained group of volunteers) have staffed the Members’ Lounge since 2018 to engage in conversations with audience members who struggle with racial concepts and realities depicted on our stages.
NEW COMMITTED CHANGES:
- Sharifa Johka has been OSF’s Interim Director of Equity for five years, building on the work launched by Carmen Morgan. Their impact on OSF and the whole field is immense and is behind every positive change that OSF has been celebrated for in the fields of IDEA and anti-racism. We’ve just hired a permanent Director of Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility as part of Senior Staff. We have added Accessibility to this position’s purview to acknowledge that OSF’s work in this area lags behind our Racial Equity work, and we must do better in our service to artists, staff, and audiences with disabilities.
- Our mandatory annual employee EDI training has not been consistently implemented due to the demands of the repertory schedules and resistance within the OSF community. We're restructuring our operational systems to ensure that every employee, including guest artists, receives IDEA training. Training can only be impactful when it’s frequent and integrated into our repertory schedule. Our annual training will include bystander intervention, de-escalation, and conflict resolution, as well as management and feedback training for all employees.
- We will be releasing a new Employee Manual on or around April 1, 2021, and are also working to adopt a Code of Conduct for all OSF affiliates, including volunteers and audience members. We also commit to regularly reviewing all documentation, and employment practices and procedures with an anti-racist lens. The lack of modern and anti-racist policies such as these have caused great harm within our organization.
- We have added two floating holidays so staff members can observe non-Christian holidays as they need.
- We have eliminated all 10 out of 12s in our production schedules.
- We commit to crediting BIPOC artists who help to create marketing strategies and ensure that BIPOC consultants are uplifted. How this will be achieved is still to be determined. Further, we commit to recognizing the informal work of BIPOC staff internally, and in the “Additional Production Credits” of the Playbill.
- We commit to a multi-year process of revising Board policies in order to institute and fully embrace anti-racist practices, starting with a new Code of Conduct for Board members, mechanisms to ensure that Board service expectations are met, adoption of meeting agreements, and a yearly Board assessment.
- Members of our Board of Directors have participated in voluntary anti-racism training since 2015. In the summer of 2020, OSF hired a consultant selected by the Board to create a customized training program, and most Board members participated in three 3-hour training sessions. Some BIPOC Board members were harmed during the training sessions. The Board is committed to improving future anti-racist trainings to create brave learning spaces that are safe for BIPOC Board members and staff. We commit to making future trainings mandatory for all Board members.
This list is not long enough, but it’s a beginning. Anti-racism work has no end date, and we make ourselves accountable for OSF’s ongoing commitment to meet your challenge. We owe it to you, our constituents, and the whole American theatre field.
In solidarity,
Artistic Director Nataki Garrett and Executive Director David Schmitz