EDITORIAL: Arts groups in need

It’s certainly a wake-up call to the effect of the economic downturn on local arts groups that Laguna Playhouse has halted its long-standing expansion plan and put the property slated for that plan up for sale.

The Playhouse’s proposal was to build another wing of the theater next to its existing Moulton Theater on Broadway. This plan has been in effect since 1998, when the playhouse purchased an office complex at 580 Broadway, considered the ideal site for such a venture.

But planning for such an ambitious project takes years. In 2005, a $5-million donation from Suzanne and James R. Mellor of Laguna Beach put the expansion plan into high gear.

The Playhouse is in the city’s designated Arts District, and the expansion was a key component of big plans afoot for that area, which includes the Festival of Arts, Art-A-Fair and Sawdust Festival grounds.

The Village Entrance Project, a 600-spot public parking facility, is also on the books but in limbo across the road near City Hall.

Now the Playhouse is going into “survival” mode instead of planning to expand. The proceeds from the sale of the office building will help keep the theater in business, and hopefully allow it to weather the current downturn and what could happen in the future.

Other local arts groups may also be looking at how to survive in lean times, when benefactors don’t have the funds or the incentive to donate to arts causes.

One thing that may be of help to the arts is the fact that under the Obama administration, the National Endowment for the Arts will get a financial boost. In the Bush years, the NEA was constantly under scrutiny by conservatives who believed the arts to be unimportant. But in the new administration, stimulating the arts is to be part and parcel of the overall economic stimulus plan for the nation.

That is a great leap forward for the arts nationally and locally.

Here’s an excerpt from a New York Times report on recent events, posted Feb. 13: “To the relief of cultural institutions, the economic-stimulus bill approved by Congress on Friday preserved $50 million in financing for the National Endowment for the Arts. While minuscule by comparison with some other allocations in the bill, it is a hefty sum for the endowment, whose annual budget is $145 million. Sixty percent of the new money will go to individual arts projects competing for N.E.A. funds. The remainder will be distributed to state arts agencies and regional arts organizations for dispersal.”

Hopefully some of that cash can come down our way and stop the hemorrhaging in the local arts scene.