Deficit News Doesn’t Faze Arts Official : Funding: The head of a group seeking county backing for a new arts agency says there are alternative funding sources. But Supervisor Thomas F. Riley isn’t as optimistic.

The head of a local committee that is seeking county backing for a proposed arts agency doesn’t seem worried about a recent financial forecast indicating that Orange County government may face a budget deficit of up to $63 million in two years.

But Supervisor Thomas F. Riley painted a less optimistic picture, saying that the outlook of the county administrative office report does jeopardize county funding of “additional projects such as the arts.”

“If you took a look at figures we have now, to take on a new project certainly would not be something any of us on the board would be willing to do,” Riley said Thursday.

The Committee to Form an Orange County Arts Council sent a report last week to the Board of Supervisors recommending that the county contribute $125,000 toward creation of a countywide arts agency.

But the CAO’s five-year financial forecast released this week predicts budget deficits in the next four out of five fiscal years and said that the county will have to find ways to cut spending or increase revenue to avoid these deficits.

Charles Desmarais, president of the ad-hoc Committee to Form an Orange County Arts Council, repeated Thursday that the committee’s request for $125,000 --”in cash and/or in-kind services”--need not necessarily compete with other county programs, however.

“It is my understanding that there may be alternative sources of (arts) funding,” such as money from the airport enterprise fund generated by fees charged airlines and other airport users, said Desmarais, director of the Laguna Art Museum.

Earlier, Supervisor Gaddi H. Vasquez had said the forecast is not “a doomsday prophesy,” though he, too, said it dims the prospect for funding new programs.

County supervisors are expected to give an official response to the committee’s recommendations by April 2, when the county will have completed its own study of its role in local arts support. No money from the county’s $2.9-billion budget is now earmarked for arts support.

Riley said he would wait until the county’s arts study is complete to make a final comment on the issue. He also added that “there is always a possibility of (arts) funding coming from the private sector.”

Asked if the enterprise fund might be another possibility, he said, “I’m not ruling it out, but I’m not sure at this time in the airport’s activities whether that would be a fund we could reasonably ask for assistance.”

The supervisors recently voted to apportion $40,000 from the enterprise fund to support an arts program at the new John Wayne Airport terminal, scheduled to open in September.

Desmarais, however, maintains that the county should find some room in its budget for the arts.

“It seems to me there are ways we spend our (county) money that could be looked at again,” he said. “For instance, we have a really negative kind of emphasis on ‘just saying no’ to drugs without giving kids an opportunity to say ‘yes’ to something. The arts are such a life-affirming opportunity that the county could take advantage of.”