CACHE announces Allyson Esposito’s departure
by October 27, 2022 2:12 pm 1,285 views
Allyson Esposito, the founding president and CEO of the nonprofit Creative Arkansas Community Hub & Exchange (CACHE), is leaving the Northwest Arkansas regional arts organization at the end of November.
According to a CACHE news release Thursday (Oct. 27), Esposito has accepted a job as a senior program officer at Builders Initiative, the philanthropic division of Chicago-based Builders Vision.
Builders Vision is an impact investing organization stood up in 2017 by Lukas Walton, a grandson of Walmart founders Sam and Helen Walton.
According to the release, a search for Esposito’s successor will begin soon.
“CACHE wishes Allyson well in her new role and looks forward to continued partnership with her well into the future,” the news release said.
Esposito is an arts administrator, lawyer and artist with more than 15 years of philanthropy experience across family foundations, community foundations and public agencies. She arrived in Northwest Arkansas from Boston — where she had been senior director of arts and culture for the Boston Foundation — in 2019 to create a regional arts organization before it even had a formal name.
CACHE is a regional agency focused on connecting, supporting and developing Northwest Arkansas’ arts, culture and creative communities. The idea was born as part of the Walton Family Foundation’s 2020 Home Region Plan. The Northwest Arkansas Council, a nonprofit group of business and community leaders, initially provided CACHE’s administrative support, but the organization shifted from a branch of the Northwest Arkansas Council to an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit with tax-exempt status earlier this year.
Among other successes, under Allyson’s leadership, CACHE:
- Launched more than 36 programs, such as the Year of Learning and Outreach (YOLO), Music Organizations Advancement Coalition (MOAC), and the Municipal Arts Alliance, and initiatives, including CACHE’s Artist and Organization Directory and the Northwest Arkansas Creative Calendar.
- Awarded $2.96 million to Northwest Arkansas creatives and organizations through programs like Bridge Fund, OzCast, and the Creative Exchange Fund.
More about Esposito and her career is available in this Northwest Arkansas Business Journal profile from December 2019.