Every week on our “Knight Cities” podcast, civic innovators join me to discuss ways we can create successful cities. Last week I spoke with Dennis Scholl, vice president for arts at Knight Foundation. Here are five things you should know from my conversation with Dennis:

1. The arts can bind a community and bring it together. The only other ways that happens as powerfully in communities, generally, are during crises and through sports teams.
2. Free is good. A lot of arts institutions worry about giving away their product, but free can be an important way to introduce new audiences to the arts.
3. When we have grants that don’t go well, it’s generally a leadership issue. You are better off with a very good leader and a mediocre idea than with a very good idea with a mediocre leader. Ideas can morph and change and pivot, but people generally don’t.  
4. You have to give people a chance to surprise you.
5. It is now widely acknowledged that art and artists create vibrancy in neighborhoods. Art is no longer funded as charity. It’s funded because it’s good business.  

Listen to my conversation with Dennis here. And sign up for the “Knight Cities” newsletter to get alerts as soon as new conversations are posted.

Look for new “Knight Cities” content posted every Wednesday here. You can follow us on Twitter at #knightcities or @knightfdn. And if you have ideas for people you’d like to hear more from, please email me.

Carol Coletta is vice president of community and national initiatives at Knight Foundation. Follow her on Twitter @ccoletta.