Harold Shapiro Photo
Department of Cultural Affairs Director Barbara Lamb, Public Art Coordinator Margaret Bodell, and Kim Futrell
Barbara Lamb, who’s served as director of the City of New Haven’s Department of Cultural Affairs, plans to retire on Sept. 16.
“I really feel like it’s time to step down, time for me to move on to other things,” Lamb said.
Lamb said she’ll stay involved with New Haven Sister Cities as president of the program’s Board of Directors.
Lamb became acting director of New Haven’s Department of Cultural Affairs in fall 2000 and was named the department’s permanent director soon thereafter.
“We’ve really taken the department in a lot of new and exciting directions from where it was 11 years ago,” Lamb said.
When she arrived, Lamb said the department planned events and administered community grants.
“We’ve really diversified the kinds of things we’re doing,” she said, despite staff and funding reductions.
Lamb cited the presentation of a Ray Charles concert, the filming in New Haven of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, and her department’s Project Storefronts initiative as highlights of her tenure.
Project Storefronts, Lamb said, “has been a huge highlight. It’s been a big hit. It really helps to take the Cultural Affairs Department in a whole new direction. By that, Lamb referred to the missions of her department and the city’s Economic Development Administration.
The biggest challenge for her successor, Lamb said, will be juggling the department’s diverse projects. A job description, Lamb said, should be posted on the city’s website by tomorrow.