A push by Merced artists to pause two $10,000 mural projects revealed confusion over how the projects were shaped and what the city’s Arts and Culture Advisory Commission was asked to approve.
Four members of Merced’s arts community spoke before the Merced City Council on Sept. 8, asking officials to freeze the current request for proposal, or RFP, and reconsider the amount of money offered for each project.
For local muralist Eddie Rodriguez, that concern comes from experience doing city work.
“I think for every mural I’ve done for the city, maybe not my first electrical box, but every mural since then, I pretty much just operated at a loss,” Rodriguez said in an interview after the meeting. “It costs me money to do this project. I do it because I love the city, and yeah, I want to have beautiful art for here.”
The dispute comes as Merced leans further into public art. The city was recently designated a California Cultural District, while the Merced AF festival added a new wave of privately funded murals downtown.
RFP deadline at month’s end
The current request for proposals, or RFP, is for a mural on M Street and another at the Public Works Corporation yard, with an application deadline of Sept. 30. Government agencies use RFPs to provide a fair and competitive process when selecting contractors for projects.
The artists argued that the $10,000 budgets for each project leave too little for artist pay after insurance, equipment, materials, wall preparation and other costs.
The money must cover artist fees, design work, materials, supplies, equipment, surface preparation, transportation, installation, insurance and other costs tied to completing the project.
Jennifer Flachman, public information officer for the city of Merced, said the city may power wash the site in advance in an effort to reduce preparation costs.
The city does not use one set formula to determine how much to pay for a public art project, Flachman said.
Pricing can vary based on an artist’s experience, the complexity of the design, the time needed to complete the work, materials and other needs tied to the project, Flachman said. Square-foot pricing is one method city staff is considering as Merced continues developing its public art program.
The two projects also give artists different instructions.
At the Public Works Corporation Yard, there is no minimum amount of wall space an artist must cover. Artists can choose between an 85-foot or 46-foot wall and determine the size, placement, and proportions of their mural, Flachman said.
For the M Street Bridge, artists are expected to develop a concept that considers all 10 concrete barrier sections, four at 15 feet and six at 7 feet, though the sections do not have to contain identical or continuous images.
What artists say
Muralist and illustrator Jazz Diaz-Shane told the council that the city of Merced has come a long way in supporting public art, from creating an Arts and Culture Advisory Commission to becoming part of a cultural district.
But she said the city risks lowering what working artists can expect to earn after expenses such as insurance, equipment rentals and more.
“Paying $10,000 for these two projects is not enough on the labor side of things,” Diaz-Shane said. “When you make these calls at a low rate, someone will take the job for low pay. I think it is our responsibility to encourage and support and protect artists to create fair standard pay rates.”
Rather than stretch the available money across both murals, she asked the city to reconsider the number of projects.
“Maybe right now we cannot afford two mural projects,” Diaz-Shane said. “We can afford one mural project.”
The city has not identified anything in the California Arts Council’s Cultural District requirements that sets a minimum mural payment, square-foot rate or specific compensation level tied to Merced’s designation, Flachman said.
After the meeting and in an interview with FOCUS local artists, Rodriguez, Patricia Pratt and Diaz-Shane described how city art contracts can look very different once an artist starts preparing to bid for a project.
All three have worked on public art projects in Merced and said the costs can begin before any artist touches the wall.
“You can spend a week or two weeks doing the research that you’re going to do for a project for a design, and then you end up not getting it,” he said.
Diaz-Shane wants the city to consider deposits, something she said she has used with other clients.
“It would be helpful if they could put down deposits, and other cities do that,” she said. “I think this also encourages up-and-coming artists to be able to apply.”
The timing of the projects also affects the work, Rodriguez said, because summer heat can reduce painting hours and affect how materials respond.
“Sometimes you could be mixing a color on your palette, and from the split second that it takes you from your palette to the wall, it’s already dried,” Rodriguez said. “Because of that, you have to work either close to sunrise or close to sunset.”
That can push muralists toward split schedules, working early in the morning and returning after the hottest hours pass.
Still, Rodriguez said he does not believe the city intentionally tried to underpay artists.
“I don’t suspect a malicious intent,” Rodriguez said. “I do think that now with us speaking, they can see we really do have to be mindful of paying artists a fair wage.”
Confusion about how the arts and culture commission operates
During the meeting, Pratt asked for a summary of arts spending since 2022.
She said the commission had not agendized and approved minutes since January 2025, making past decisions harder for new members to trace.
“So how do you expect commissioners who are new to the commission, where it’s their first day, to be making decisions when there’s no public record of what’s happened in the past?” Pratt asked.
She also questioned how much of the city’s arts planning happens through subcommittees, where she said less of the discussion reaches the public.
“A lot of these decisions are made by subcommittees, which is great because it takes the pressure off of everybody having to get involved, and they can go and research fully,” Pratt said. “But it stops public conversation because then all you get are recommendations at the end.”
Pratt also told council that the commission voted in 2025 to hold public meetings about how arts funding would be spent, but she said those meetings did not happen.
Rodriguez also described what the process looked like from inside the commission, since he served on the Arts and Culture Advisory Commission until about two months before making his comments before the city council. The decision involving the current mural RFPs happened after he left.
During his time on the commission, Rodriguez said members sometimes received money for arts projects without clear direction on how many projects it was expected to cover.
“Often, it would be frustrating from my end because we would get an allocated amount, and then we would be thinking that they’re going to have so many projects, or certain types of projects, and it wasn’t always clear,” Rodriguez said. “OK, how are we going to spend this budget?”
Rodriguez would also like residents to have more say before the city decides what kinds of art to fund, he said.
“I wish there was a way to open it up to the public to say what kind of projects do you guys want?” Rodriguez said.
District 3 Arts and Culture Commissioner Glen Camarda also supported pausing the RFP.
“I’d like us to see a freeze on that project, and maybe somehow come back and visit that and see what we can do to correct it and make sure that … people are getting paid right and that the project is being done right,” Camarda said.
Council discusses mural projects
Toward the end of the meeting, District 6 Councilmember Fue Xiong asked for the issue to return on a future agenda so the council could consider pausing the RFP and discussing fair compensation for artists.
That request did not receive enough support to move forward.
Mayor Matthew Serratto, District 4 Councilmember Shane Smith and District 3 Councilmember Mike Harris instead favored continuing the application process.
For Smith, hearing about unfair pay came as a surprise.
“This is a blind spot for me,” Smith said. “I didn’t hear from the Arts and Culture Commission that that’s not a fair price to split these two mural projects, when originally it was supposed to be one.”
The council, Smith noted, relied on the Arts and Culture Advisory Commission for guidance.
“They voted to suggest the mural location at the Corporation Yard in south Merced,” he said. “Then, at the last minute, they decided to propose both the Corporation Yard and the M Street Bridge.”
More money was then found to support both locations, he said.
The Arts and Culture Advisory Commission’s formal recommendation was up to $15,000 for one commemorative mural, according to Flachman. The commission approved that recommendation in a 4-0 vote July 16.
The City Council later reduced funding for the Utility Box Refresh Project from $20,000 to $15,000, freeing another $5,000 for murals, Flachman said.
That money, combined with the original $15,000 mural allocation, gave the council $20,000 for the two locations.
The council approved two projects at $10,000 each on Aug. 3.
The council’s discussion and action at that meeting set the project’s funding allocation.
Rather than stop the process now, Smith said the council should let the RFP play out and make the final decision after reviewing the proposals.
“If, at the end of the day, we don’t get proposals that meet the criteria and the quality that we wanted, then we vote to reject the proposals,” Smith said. “And we go back to making the decision we should have made, which is Corporation Yard or M Street Bridge, and not both.”
Harris questioned whether the Arts and Culture Advisory Commission was working with the same understanding of the projects as city staff and council members.
“It never really came to that commission the way it should have,” he said.
Harris, who serves as an ex-officio member of the arts council because of his position on city council, also said he raised concerns during that earlier discussion that $20,000 did not seem like enough money for all the work being considered.
Harris did not support stopping the current RFP.
“I agree with letting this play out and maybe restarting it with the right information,” he said.
After the deadline, the Arts and Culture Advisory Commission will review eligible proposals before sending recommendations to the City Council, which will make the final selections.
Xiong requested city staff compile a report on art spending dating back to 2022. Staff expects to complete that by Oct. 19.
Serratto also acknowledged that the final result may have missed the mark, but he favored continuing the current process.
“Our investments in art, and primarily all the work of our incredible artists, have transformed downtown,” Serratto said. “It’s important to treat the artists fairly. Maybe we didn’t do it right. Maybe the artists are right on this one that we didn’t do enough.”
