FESTIVAL, ARTS GROUPS TO MEET OVER FUNDING

The Festival of Arts and Pageant of the Masters, Laguna Beach’s famed annual summer attraction, is seeking to increase the share of festival proceeds that now go to cultural organizations, according to local art activists.

The festival board, which has called a meeting of cultural organizations for May 1 at the festival’s Forum Theatre, is expected to propose that additional monies for cultural programs be distributed through a newly created nonprofit body.

The proposal comes while the festival is still deadlocked in lease-renewal negotiations with the City of Laguna Beach, which owns the festival’s six-acre site.

At issue is lowering the city’s share of festival revenues. An increase in support for cultural groups, sources said, could come from such a rent reduction.

This year’s Pageant of the Masters and Festival of Arts will run from July 9 to Aug. 28. The pageant, the tableaux spectacle of celebrated artworks, drew approximately 136,000 visitors last summer--a sellout attendance for the 19th straight year--and grossed $2.5 million.

Last year, the city’s share of the summer event’s proceeds was $388,137, mostly from gate receipts. The city put most of its share, $300,000, to pay off its Main Beach redevelopment bond project, city aides reported.

However, the city is also required under the present lease--which expires in 1990--to allocate at least 15% of its share to support community organizations.

About $37,500 of the city share was divided among 12 “cultural or artistic” organizations last year, including $7,200 each to the Laguna Art Museum and city Arts Commission, according to Councilman Neil Fitzpatrick, a member of the city’s festival negotiating team.

(In a separate fund, the festival board last year gave $51,900 to five cultural programs, including the Laguna College of Art, Laguna Art Museum and Ballet Pacifica. Another $108,000 was given for student scholarships.)

Jack Kemp, festival board president, and other festival officials have refused to discuss the May 1 meeting or the status of lease negotiations, except to say they are seeking a “dramatic breakthrough” in local arts support and that the meeting is linked to the city talks.

But one local arts activist, who asked not to be named, depicted the meeting this way: “I think they (festival officials) want some kind of united front to present to City Hall. It would be a natural move on their part. Arts groups here need money badly, and this could be one way to do it--by using some of the (festival) revenue that now goes to the city,”

In current negotiations, said Fitzpatrick, the festival is asking to cut the city’s share of gross gate receipts from the 17.5% in the present lease to 10%.

Also, festival officials have argued that the lease negotiations have stalled its long-touted $5-million expansion to the Laguna Canyon Road complex, which includes the 232-seat Forum Theatre, as well as the Irvine Bowl and exhibition grounds.

Under a 1983 plan, 600 seats would be added to the 2,662-seat Irvine Bowl, a parking facility would be built next door and the stage house and shop areas would be upgraded.

The plan was approved after the board decided against moving to a larger site in the city’s upper Laguna Canyon sector or building a second amphitheater next to the Irvine Bowl.

But, according to festival officials, no work has been done under the 1983 plan, which is to be financed from festival proceeds. These officials have argued they are counting on extra monies from a city rent reduction to help pay for the project.

Kemp contends that if current negotiations with the city remain deadlocked over the proposed rent reduction, the festival might once again consider moving to another location in Laguna Beach or even to another Orange County city.

“Anything is possible if we can’t settle this lease issue,” said Kemp.