ARTS FESTIVAL : SHOWDOWN LOOMS OVER RENT ISSUE

The Laguna Beach Festival of Arts, deadlocked for months over negotiations for a new municipal lease, is heading for a showdown with the city, which owns the six-acre site of the festival on Laguna Canyon Road.

Organizers of the summer festival, best known for its Pageant of the Masters tableaux spectacle, have called for a local coalition of cultural groups to back a move to drastically cut the city’s annual share of festival revenues.

Under the proposal to be discussed at a City Council hearing tentatively set for May 20, the monies from the reduced rent would pay for renovating festival facilities and boosting allocations to cultural programs.

“We need you to exert pressure on the city to be reasonable,” the festival’s financial consultant, Paul Griem, told 75 cultural representatives Thursday evening at the Forum Theatre. “You can’t stand by while the goose that laid the golden egg is in danger of being killed. Help save the goose.”

Griem’s “golden egg” remark referred to the huge success of the festival as a tourist attraction. This year’s exhibition-and-tableaux event, July 9 to Aug. 28, is expected to draw 250,000 visitors and gross over $2.5 million.

Speaking for the festival board, Griem warned that if the city fails to agree to lower the rent--primarily by cutting the city’s share of gross gate receipts from the current 17.5% to the festival-proposed 10%--the festival would consider shutting down in 1990, when the current 18-year lease expires.

“We wouldn’t be able to renovate and survive and to give out the (cultural) grants. We would have to close shop and go out of business,” Griem said.

In a phone interview after the meeting, Councilman Neil Fitzpatrick, a member of the city’s negotiating team, said: “They have some legitimate concerns, but they haven’t really engaged in a give-and-take. I don’t think they want to shut down--they have too much at stake in our community. If they did, I’m sure someone else would be willing to continue the shows.”

Some representatives at Thursday’s meeting--including those from the Laguna College of Art and Laguna Moulton Playhouse--said they would back the festival at the city hearing. They argued that declining fiscal support for cultural organizations was endangering Laguna Beach’s national reputation as an arts colony.

“We’re 100% behind what the festival wants to do. The established groups are facing a critical situation in just keeping up with growth, while newer groups aren’t getting the chance to really thrive,” Douglas Rowe, Laguna Moulton Playhouse executive director, said after the meeting.

According to Griem, the cultural groups’ share of festival revenues has dwindled as the city’s share has greatly increased. The festival’s direct grants to cultural groups has been cut drastically in recent years--last year’s total was only $44,000, he said.

At the same time, Griem contended, the city’s own allocation of festival revenues to cultural groups is much lower than that prescribed under the current lease. Last year, he claimed, only $17,000 in such city grants was awarded to cultural groups. Recipients included the Laguna Art Museum, Laguna Moulton Playhouse and city Arts Commission.

Disputing that lower figure, Fitzpatrick said, “the city obviously uses a far broader definition than the festival on what constitutes cultural or artistic programs.”

Most of the city’s rent goes to retiring the city’s Main Beach bonds, Fitzpatrick said. Last year, the city received $388,000 in festival rent, of which $288,000 went to the bond project.

Under the festival’s proposal, the amount given to both cultural groups and arts scholarships would be substantially increased--up to at least $240,000 a year initially, said Griem.

Because of the negotiations deadlock, the festival has had to shelve a 1983 plan to add 600 seats to the 2,662-seat Irvine Bowl and build a parking facility, Griem said. But still being sought, he added, is a $3-million renovation of bowl seating and stage and an expansion of the service shop facilities.

“But we can’t do that under the present lease without eliminating the scholarships and cutting or dropping all the grants,” he said. In direct grants last year the festival gave $108,000 in scholarships, as well as the $44,000 to cultural groups.

The festival has all but ruled out a move to a less-crowded site in Laguna Beach or another city, said Griem. “We have decided to stay put and make this site work as best we can. But if we’re not allowed to, we may have to shut down,” he added.

Last month, the City Council received an Arts Commission plan that includes a proposal for a fund drive involving all local arts organizations. The commission plan, to be given a council hearing this summer, also calls for expanded city sponsorship of public art exhibits and performances, much of which could be financed by revenues from special developmental fees.