City Plans Renovation of DWP Building : N. Hollywood to Get Community Arts Center

A dilapidated but stylish art deco building in North Hollywood, used for nearly 40 years by area residents as a place to pay their utility bills, has been purchased by the City of Los Angeles to be used as a community cultural center.

The two-story concrete building, built in 1939 in the classic architectural style of the time, will be transformed into an art gallery and performing arts center that will provide a forum for everything from bizarre rock videos to genteel chamber music, city officials said Wednesday.

The Cultural Affairs Department will sponsor a citywide competition to select an architectural plan to repair the run-down interior of the Lankershim Boulevard landmark, said Fred Croton, general manager of the department. Croton said the pigeon-infested building will require $250,000 in renovations before it can be opened to the public.

The facility will be the city’s 10th and largest cultural center and the first to be established since the city created the Cultural Affairs Department in 1980, Croton said. The cultural center was first proposed four years ago by Councilman Joel Wachs.

The building, owned by the Department of Water and Power, has been sought after by numerous private developers and artistic groups, city officials said.

Paid $250,000

The city’s Department of General Services purchased the site for $250,000, using money it had collected over several years from federal community development grants. The renovations also will by paid for with federal funds, city officials said.

Officials said the center could open as early as this fall.

“We see the arts as an instrument to upgrade this entire area of North Hollywood,” Wachs said during a tour of the facility. “The arts are vital for a good, thriving community. It would be great to develop a reputation for this area that it has the arts, and that, in turn, will bring the restaurants and other businesses.”

The 6,900-square-foot structure, built as a billing and administrative office by the DWP, is tucked between a furrier and a discount stereo outlet on Lankershim Boulevard, just south of Magnolia Boulevard. It lies within the North Hollywood Redevelopment Project area and will be just a block away from a proposed $83-million hotel, office, retail and entertainment complex.

“They are going to be good boosters for each other,” said Lillian Burkenheim, assistant project manager for the North Hollywood Redevelopment Project. “When you start teaching people about the arts, the more interested they become. It is just like Broadway. It creates its own interest because of all the theaters and arts. It builds its own excitement.”

The DWP building was declared an historic and cultural monument in 1980 by the Los Angeles Cultural Heritage Board, three years after the public utility vacated the site to consolidate its operations.

Since then, the building periodically has been leased to several studios, television stations and local theater groups for filming and occasional performances. The building’s well-preserved, beveled concrete-and-glass facade has been a favorite of film crews attempting to recreate the ambiance of the art deco era, according to Lee Moussafir, chief real estate officer for the DWP.

The building’s most recognizable use in recent years, however, has been as a haven for pigeons.

The exquisite main floor of yellow, green and red tiles has a coating of pigeon droppings and the main staircase--lined with a stylish, angular metal railing--is littered with dead birds and feathers. Only 10 overhead, opaque glass-and-lead lamps, installed when the building was constructed, seem to have escaped the pesty birds.

“It is an architectural monument with its wonderful high ceilings and adornments,” Croton said. “If you can see past the dead pigeons, you will see that it is great.”

The cultural center will include an 1,100-square-foot art gallery on the first floor that will also serve as a lecture and musical performance hall. The second floor will have a 150-seat auditorium for dance and theatrical performances as well as classrooms for instruction.

The city’s other nine cultural centers, including one in Tujunga, provide similar facilities but on a smaller scale.

City officials said that although plans for the North Hollywood facility are not final, it will serve both amateur and professional groups. The center is expected to draw heavily from the senior citizen community in the North Hollywood area to find volunteers and an audience for events.

Croton said demographic studies of the area show that at least 50% of the people living within three miles of the center are over 60. “It makes an interesting mix for us,” he said. “We will have to develop programs consistent with their interests while at the same time bringing in aspects of the contemporary arts.”

The center, which will be operated by the Cultural Affairs Department, is expected to have three full-time staff members, including an artistic director, a program director and a secretary. It will operate on a $120,000 annual budget, Croton said.

Croton said the center will be “city managed and community run . . . We are expecting great local involvement. Based on our phone calls and mail, we know there is a great interest and demand for this. We have a large file of people who want to use it.”

Work on the center will not get under way for at least several weeks while the city completes the transfer of the deed. The purchase has already been approved by both the City Council and Mayor Tom Bradley.

Wachs said that he and Bradley, who he said helped secure federal funding for the facility, will hold a public ceremony at the site next month when the sale becomes final.

“We are really looking forward to this,” Wachs said. “We have our fingers crossed. We are hoping to accelerate this now that we have the four-year haul behind us.”