That was the message that was texted to me after I ducked out of Commissioner Sam Adams’ “Creative Capacity” townhall Tuesday night, due to some previous obligations. I missed the best part.

“What could that possibly mean?” I thought. I mean, I’d seen some of the numbers about arts’ impact on the economy, plus listened to some of the 300 people (give or take) talk about the challenges small arts groups have—and believe me, they’ve got a lot, like troubles finding adequate spaces for shows.

The next morning, I got a sneak preview of what it was I missed—Adams told the crowd that they, not in so many words, needed to get their shit together if they wanted to secure ongoing funding for the arts. Today, thanks to the beauty of internet video, I was able to catch up.

Adams lured arts advocates in with promises of a place to vent their frustrations, and after that, he pummeled them with speeches about the political reality of getting funding. Ultimately, it was something of a call to arms.

Portland ranks 21st among cities in per capita public spending on art; even worse, Oregon ranks 47th among the 50 states. Broken down, Portlanders each spend about six bucks per year for public art, residents in the Metro area spend a bit over $2, and Oregonians as a whole spend less than $1.

If that sounds abysmal, the lessons from Jim Desmond, director of greenspaces for Metro, and political consultant Mark Wiener pushed it over the edge: The prospects of pushing through funding for the arts will be next to impossible—unless arts advocates can organize and then commit time and money for something like a bond measure. Even then, it’s an uphill battle. The last time Portland had an arts bond on the ballot—a 2 percent increase to the hotel tax—the hotel industry crushed it, miserably. According to Wiener, all they had to do was put up some simple white billboards with black text that read “$50 million for art is too much.”

I’d be stretching all known bounds of truth to call myself an artist or an art expert, so I’m wondering what people in the Portland arts community thought/think about Adams’ message. Is the idea of organizing such a disparate community into a solid political campaign even feasible? Is an arts bond even the way to go? What about the idea of public funding for arts in the first place (and I’m talking to artists here, not Republican trolls, thank you)? Does it just foster mediocrity? Should artists rise and fall based solely on their place in the art market?

Here’s the video, if you missed it. If you don’t have time to watch all of it, I recommend skipping to about the 1hr, 15min mark. There’s more here, here, here, and here.