{"id":106247,"date":"2025-12-31T13:45:06","date_gmt":"2025-12-31T13:45:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/106247\/"},"modified":"2025-12-31T13:45:06","modified_gmt":"2025-12-31T13:45:06","slug":"sims-announces-dick-chalmers-music-venue-program-the-austin-chronicle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/106247\/","title":{"rendered":"SIMS Announces Dick Chalmers Music Venue Program \u2022 The Austin Chronicle"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the tight black booths of Empire Control Room and Garage, where Richard \u201cDick\u201d Chalmers spent endless days editing videos and creating custom drink menus for the Red River stage, the late<\/a> legend and other venue veterans started piecing together a different kind of project. The Dick Chalmers Music Venue Program<\/a> was born of these conversations, a concerted effort to reach music venue workers that might be unaware of their SIMS eligibility and to open avenues for stages to support their mental health.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a two-part challenge, which is letting people know it exists and then normalizing and removing that barrier to actually take advantage of those services,\u201d says Development and Operations Coordinator Jason Amato. Music venue employees have always been covered by SIMS\u2019 mental health and substance abuse recovery services, but that hasn\u2019t always seemed obvious. The organization wanted to reach more technical staff and knew they\u2019d need a fundraising boost to support an increased client base.<\/p>\n

The brainstorming began after SIMS\u2019 30th anniversary show<\/a> this May, which Empire hosted. In what everyone describes as true Chalmers form, the jack-of-all-trades went above and beyond for the nonprofit organization, turning on his artistic direction skills for the celebratory mini-festival\u2019s onstage video and lighting.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe understood the culture of a community-based music venue, because that was his only game,\u201d says Stephen Flynn, a longtime general manager at Empire, who left the venue this summer after working by Chalmers\u2019 side for five years. \u201cWe used to say he was a part of the walls. He\u2019d been there since the end of year one [and] had worn many hats.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

It seemed natural that the big brother of Red River, a mentor to many in the district and, according to Flynn, \u201ceverybody\u2019s first call,\u201d should be at the nexus of a fledgling program where, as Amato put it, \u201cpriority number one is making sure that this is for the community and by the community.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Flynn joined the community roundtable, becoming an official member of the advisory board working alongside Chalmers, Amato, and SIMS Chief Advancement Officer Sarah Andrews, puzzling out how to get services to more staff and how to cover the subsequent increased cost. They understood, better than most, that music venues have tight margins, so creative fundraising ideas were a must.<\/p>\n

\u201cKnowing that many folks who work in these types of roles maybe aren\u2019t insured or underinsured, we wanted to simultaneously build our ability to sustain the program, if the demand was very high,\u201d says Andrews. The campaign they came up with invites venues to make monthly donations to the organization, throw SIMS benefit shows, or ask patrons for donations alongside tips. This month\u2019s dry January partnership with Rambler brings sparkling mocktails to participating venues across town \u2013 a portion of each purchase benefits SIMS.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we lost Dick, I think we realized that he really had such a big impact on not only this program that we just created, but on this entire venue space in Austin,\u201d says Andrews.<\/p>\n

Naming the initiative after Chalmers just made sense. Losing him unexpectedly this November hit Red River hard, leaving a gap where his contagious community spirit, his stories of old Austin, and his patient enthusiasm for helping others once loomed large.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a program that is taking care of our community in a direct sense,\u201d says Flynn. \u201cIf anything\u2019s gonna carry on his legacy, I think that\u2019s a pretty damn good way to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

This article appears in January 2 \u2022\u00a02026<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A note to readers:\u00a0Bold and uncensored,\u00a0The Austin Chronicle\u00a0has been Austin\u2019s independent news source for over 40 years, expressing the community\u2019s political and environmental concerns and supporting its active cultural scene. Now more than ever, we need your support to continue supplying Austin with independent, free press. If real news is important to you, please consider making a donation of $5, $10 or whatever you can afford, to help keep our journalism on stands. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In the tight black booths of Empire Control Room and Garage, where Richard \u201cDick\u201d Chalmers spent endless days…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":106248,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133,44369],"class_list":{"0":"post-106247","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-austin","8":"tag-austin","9":"tag-austin-headlines","10":"tag-austin-news","11":"tag-sims-foundation"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106247","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106247"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106247\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/106248"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}