Shortly after the Clark County Public Art Program was created, one of its first potential funding projects to tackle was at Child Haven, the county’s emergency shelter protecting abused, abandoned and neglected children. When it comes to advocating art in the community as a way to enhance lives, this was an easy choice: While the cottages at Child Haven provide temporary housing in a fairly quaint environment, the intake area where kids first arrive is bland and unwelcoming, particularly for a scared child.

“They’re coming to Child Haven under intense circumstances,” says Michael Ogilvie, the county’s public art cultural specialist. “They’ve been physically and emotionally abused or have been abandoned. After they’re checked in, they go down this long corridor, and it couldn’t look more institutional.”

Next week three artists (selected from 33 applicants) will present proposals for the $65,000 art renovation project set to begin this year. The finalists are Rachel Mosley, Robert Beckmann and Sush Machida, two of whom have murals in Southern Nevada—Beckmann in downtown Henderson and in local casinos and Machida on the Emergency Arts building in Downtown Las Vegas. Mosley is a figurative realist painter.

Ogilvie says this is the first large project the county is taking on using funds from the new arts program. Funds have already been directed to smaller projects, including the Zap! project, which commissioned artists to paint utility boxes. Next up is the Siegfried and Roy Park.