Giving Compass' Take:

• LA Weekly reports on Casa 0101, a theater in Los Angeles that showcases Latinx productions, but is in danger of closing down due to funding problems. What does that say about larger efforts to promote diversity in the arts?

• The nonprofit arts community should be supporting institutions like Casa 0101 and examining this stark disparity in financing: "The richest 2 percent of the arts organizations reap nearly 60 percent of the philanthropic wealth."

• It all starts at the top: Here's how to address the lack of diversity on foundation boards.

For a city that is more than 48 percent Latino, the loss of Casa 0101, one of only three all-Latino stages that produce regular seasons of plays in Los Angeles, might be incalculable to its audience, but it would be a Richter-scaled catastrophe to L.A.'s Latinx theater artists. Casa represents a disproportionate amount of the stage roles available to Latina/o actors — lead roles that are essential to every actor for developing the craft that is a prerequisite to better-paying film and TV work.

But the very fact that Casa 0101 finds itself in fiscal straits underscores what grantmakers and Latino theater-makers alike say is a larger dysfunction in the nonprofit arts.

Some of the system's starkest disparities are found right here in Los Angeles. In a groundbreaking 2011 study, arts research group Helicon Collaborative found shocking inequalities in arts funding relative to demographics. A follow-up Helicon report, published last year, concluded the inequalities had only gotten worse for underrepresented communities of color. How unequal can be summed up in a single statistic: Though Angelenos of color represent 72 percent of L.A.'s population, funding for "culturally specific groups" amounted to a mere 8 percent.

Read the full article about Casa 0101 and the funding crisis to improve diversity in the arts by Bill Raden at LA Weekly.