Our financial goals are ambitious. When our third year is done, we would optimally like our program to be in the $500,000 category for earnings, grants and donations. For our first fiscal year as a not-for-profit corporation, we are currently aiming at a budget of $70,000.

Having previously worked with the major Arts and Humanities funding agencies and entities in the Eastern Nebraska area, we have laid the ground work for future grant applications and community involvement and support. Our relationships with these agencies are already excellent: in the summer of 2004, when The Swan Theatre found itself unable to continue functioning as a producer, we were able to raise the budget requirements on our own within only ten days. We received generous gifts from the Nebraska Arts Council and the Lincoln Community Fund, as well as from The Mill Coffee House and private individuals. We have been and continue to be pleased, not only with the generosity of these gifts, but also with the increased public support they represent.

While having our own space would be a generous benefit, it is not necessarily a part of the current three year plan of the Flatwater Shakespeare Company. Instead, we will continue to develop the relationships which we have developed with various venues over the past four years. Since our decision to become an independent organization, collaborative possibilities have opened up with the University of Nebraska, The Lied Center and various local Lincoln theatres. We have initiated contact with various colleges in the area, as well, and have already received warm responses from institutions including Doane College and Nebraska Wesleyan. As we pursue these and other possibilities, we will need to rent space for offices, rehearsals, and classes in the interim. Our preference will be to begin looking for a home in our second three year cycle. Until then, we would prefer paying artists to paying overhead.

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