ARTS CHIEF GETS LIFT IN LEGISLATURE

In sharp counterpoint to her encounter in the Legislature last week, California Arts Council Director Marilyn Ryan got kid-glove treatment this week when she faced the Senate finance subcommittee that handles the council’s budget.

Instead of the rather contentious “Miss Ryans” that she had heard before the comparable Assembly subcommittee and its chair, Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles), the council director and former Republican Assemblywoman collected a shower of friendlier “Marilyns.”

Instead of being rebuked for failing to spend the $100,000 allocated last July for a minority arts program, she heard no mention of it.

And in place of strong criticism for not moving the council’s Southern California office out of Van Nuys into “a centrally located area of Los Angeles” (to make it more accessible to minority groups), as the Legislature stipulated last year, Ryan, in effect, drew praise for saving taxpayer money from the Senate subcommittee chairman, Alan Robbins (D-Van Nuys).

Ever since his arrival in the Legislature in 1973, Robbins has made the construction of a state office building in Van Nuys a top priority. The Arts Council took space there shortly before the building formally opened in February.

On a unanimous 3-0 vote Tuesday afternoon, Robbins’ subcommittee favored retention of the Van Nuys office--and Ryan’s full salary. On April 17, Waters’ subcommittee voted 4-3 along straight party lines to fund only three months of the director’s $60,000 annual salary until there was compliance with the Assembly subcommittee on the move.

The entire matter may have to be resolved by an Assembly/Senate conference committee meeting at the end of May. Robbins, meanwhile, claimed that he spoke to a Democratic Assemblyman on Waters’ subcommittee who has switched in favor of retaining the Van Nuys office, “thus obviating the necessity of our squabbling over the issue (in conference).” Robbins later declined to name the legislator. “I’m not being secretive about it,” he explained. He just didn’t want to speak for the other legislator.

Today, at a regular meeting being held at Caltech in Pasadena, the Arts Council itself is dealing with the matter of the move and minority programs.

The benevolent attitude toward Ryan in the Senate hearing room was obvious from the start. “You’ve been very patient, Marilyn,” Robbins said soothingly, referring to her 45-minute wait in the front row of the hearing room while his subcommittee No. 4 took up such matters as the Fresno Armory and various veterans affairs bills.

When the location of the Southern California office came up, Robbins interrupted Ryan with some flair: “This is the proposal to move the southern office of the state Arts Council out of Van Nuys in the San Fernando Valley; go on. . . . “ The room erupted into laughter.

“Why would we want to do that?” deadpanned Senate Finance Chairman Alfred Alquist (D-San Jose).

“I can’t imagine why anyone would,” Robbins said. “It seems to me that forcing the move would do nothing but waste taxpayer money . . . as well as disrupt the operations of the California Arts Council.”

“I think you’re right,” Ryan said, adding that the council was “open to suggestions” about alternative space, though this was the most “cost-effective.”

On the matter of withholding part of Ryan’s salary, Robbins stated that he “certainly would not suggest putting similar language in the Senate budget, and I sense that neither member of the subcommittee would want to (do so).” Neither Alquist nor Sen. John Seymour (R-Anaheim) did, and that was that.

As for the alleged inaccessibility of Van Nuys, Robbins later noted that “Van Nuys is in Los Angeles,” and that his constituents are “reminded when it comes to paying property taxes that this is all one city.” He added that the state building itself, at 6150 Van Nuys Blvd., is in an area that is 65% Latino, 10% black and 10% Asian.

Waters--who the week before had asserted that if you want to serve Downey, Whittier, South-Central and East Los Angeles, you do it from a more central location--is in Washington with other California legislators for congressional briefings and could not be reached for comment.

While a formal vote on the budget itself was not taken, in order to accommodate Sen. Henry Mello (D-Watsonville), chairman of the Joint Legislative Committee on the Arts, who is also in Washington, it was clear that the subcommittee would follow its Assembly Ways and Means counterpart when it reconvenes May 9. Subcommittee approval is the first key step in the legislative process before submission of the budget in June to the governor.

On April 17 the Assembly subcommittee had approved Mello’s budget of $16,585,000 for the Arts Council for fiscal 1985-86 beginning July 1. The figure is $4,006,000 more than Gov. George Deukmejian’s Department of Finance is recommending. As Senate Finance Chairman Alquist noted during the hearing, “I’m sympathetic toward it, very sympathetic. As a matter of fact, I’ll probably end up voting for it.” Robbins said he tended to be sympathetic toward it too, which would make it a 2-1 majority.

Like the Assembly subcommittee, the Senate subcommittee unanimously voted to support an appropriation of $25,000 to Filmex for a Latino film festival.

Ryan, a Deukmejian appointee, is supporting the governor’s budget.

Meanwhile, in other rooms in the Senate, officials were close to ending the impasse between Sens. David Roberti (D-Los Angeles), president pro tem and chairman of the Rules Committee, and Alquist over a vacancy in the California Arts Council--or, as their aides prefer to put it, the “situation” that develops when there are “two very qualified” persons for only one position.

The qualified persons are Consuelo Santos-Killins of San Jose, former chair of the Arts Council who is up for reappointment and is openly championed by Alquist, and Andrea Van de Kamp of Los Angeles, a public relations executive and the state attorney general’s wife, whom many believe is quietly being supported by Roberti. It was also understood that without resolution of the matter, the arts budget itself would have been affected. Alquist’s chief of staff said as much last week.

One informed legislative source said the matter was “a tempest in a teapot that got out of hand.” The source said that Roberti, with all his other concerns, had not been aware that Alquist was so strongly supporting Santos-Killins.

On Tuesday, as Robbins’ subcommittee was meeting, Roberti amended SB 1098, which formerly belonged to Sen. Kenneth Maddy (R-Fresno), adding two members to the Arts Council. One would be appointed by Assembly Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco), the other by Roberti’s Senate Rules Committee. While ultimate approval can be expected in the Democratic-controlled Legislature, the governor has veto power.

Within the next few weeks Santos-Killins is expected to get the first and thus far the only solid appointment. “You can be reassured,” a key legislative source said, “that it will be Consuelo.”

And Alquist said he is “quite certain” she will be named.

At present, the Arts Council has 11 members--nine are gubernatorial appointments and two legislative--one by the Assembly Speaker and by the Senate Rules Committee. In addition to the latter vacancy, Deukmejian has a vacancy in his appointment roster.

Larry Thomas, Deukmejian’s press secretary, told The Times that while he doesn’t want to “prejudge the governor . . . as a general rule he is opposed to the expansion of boards and commissions.”

Meanwhile, some arts observers see the expansion bill as a face-saving device.