The mission of the Houston Arts Alliance (HAA) is to implement the City of Houston's vision, values, and goals for arts grantmaking and civic art investments. They work under contracts with the Mayor’s Office of Cultural Affairs, executing privately funded special projects for disaster preparation, arts education equity, research on the arts state, and temporary public art to vitalize neighborhoods.
The City’s Initiative grant program, funded by the City of Houston through the Hotel Occupancy Tax, supports arts and cultural programming that enhances accessibility for the Houston community and its visitors. This grant program is focused on three main funding areas: Art + Disaster Resilience Awareness, Art + Neighborhood Cultural Destinations, and Art + Conference Tourism. Each area emphasizes projects that leverage the arts to address environmental risks, highlight cultural assets of local neighborhoods through arts activation, and enhance conference tourism with local arts and culture attractions. Grants are administered separately from other HOT-funded grants, ensuring dedicated support for these specific initiatives.