Arts for LA presents reFRAME, a series of first-person explorations of projects, places, and principles that demonstrate the ways arts and culture are building the future of Los Angeles. Each installment in this series showcases ways in which arts, culture, and arts education can be employed as tools to address issues facing Angelenos in all aspects of our lives and ultimately contribute to a higher quality of life for all residents.

By Keith McNutt

This article originally appeared in UCLA IDEA's "Themes in the News"

The following blog post by Josephine Ramirez originally appeared on the James Irvine Foundation's blog and is reprinted here by permission.

This blog was originally published by Createquity and is excerpted with permission.  Read the entire post at Createquity.

As a parent and an advocate for public education, I am urging you to vote Yes on 30 and Yes on 38 in this very important upcoming election.

Both propositions will direct billions of dollars to schools and make spending of those funds more accountable. They use different mechanisms for similar goals.

A majority of Californians support increased investment in public education, yet both statewide initiatives that would bring more money to public schools lag in the polls. How did California get in this mess? Earlier this year, at least three different political, ideological and educational “interests” were mobilizing for the ballot.

Around this time of year, when the airwaves are filled with ads for ballot measures, it’s easy to get overwhelmed and a little cynical. And yet there are local elections underway, like those for school board that will have an important impact on our kids, schools and community.

This November, Los Angeles County voters will be asked to support Measure J, a much-needed investment in our transportation system that would start up seven transit projects and eight highway improvement projects within five years and complete them within fifteen, providing traffic relief along with 250,000 good jobs. Measure J is a remarkable opportunity to put the county back to work modernizing our transportation system. It does this not by raising taxes but by extending by another 30 years the half-cent transportation sales tax voters approved in 2008.

Laura Zucker blogs about how Arts for All stays ahead of the curve.

This post originally appeared on Americans for the Arts's ARTSblog on August 10, 2012.  We thank Americans for the Arts for allowing us to repost it for our readers in Los Angeles County.