GROUPS HAIL ARTS BUDGET AS VICTORY

The state’s arts community started a new fiscal year Tuesday by calling California’s new $13.5-million arts budget a victory, even though Gov. George Deukmejian trimmed $335,000 off their spending requests.

The 1986-87 budget for the California Arts Council, which also includes federal funds, is an increase of $832,000 over last year’s $12.7-million budget, a jump of 6.3%. Retained in the budget was $648,000 of the $983,000 that had been requested by the Legislature and the California Confederation of the Arts.

Last year, Deukmejian, a Republican, approved none of the $4 million requested by the Democratic-controlled Legislature and the arts community to the chagrin of state arts leaders.

The new budget includes $911,000 of National Endowment for the Arts funding--a figure which reflects a $26,000 cut in federal funding required under the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings budget-balancing bill.

“We’re absolutely thrilled,” said California Arts Council director Robert Reid, a Republican appointed in January. “The new budget means we’ve achieved the goals that both the legislative supporters of the arts and the people in the field have been lobbying for--more money for our Multicultural and Touring-Presenting programs.”

Francis L. Dale, who was named president of the Music Center of Los Angeles County two weeks ago, said the budget “reveals that the governor is aware of the importance of art to our people and to the state.”

“It’s a good budget,” said Stephen Goldstine, Arts Council chairman and an appointee of former Democratic Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr. “If the field can make its case even more forcefully, it looks like a brighter future” for the arts in California.

While Sen. Henry Mello (D-Watsonville), chairman of the Joint Legislative Committee on the Arts, called the budget decision “a positive move,” he also said he would have liked to have seen the governor approve the Legislature’s entire spending proposal.

Significantly, Deukmejian allowed an increase of $336,000 for the council’s Multicultural Arts Program, bringing the current total to $500,000, but falling short of the Legislature’s request of $664,000. The multicultural (or ethnic-minority) program has been the predominant focus of the council’s attention and debate for the past two years.

“I’m ecstatic about the budget,” said Susan Hoffman, executive director of the Confederation, the state’s arts advocacy organization. “I don’t want to underestimate the importance of the Touring-Presenting Program, but the multicultural program will help to increase people’s attention to multicultural issues overall--the changing demographics of the state and the need for arts funding responding in kind.”

Hoffman also noted that receiving two-thirds of the funds her organization and the Legislature had requested shows that the governor “is really supportive of Bob Reid and the council leadership.” Reid replaced former GOP Assemblywoman Marilyn Ryan.

Assemblywoman Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles), a staunch supporter of the multicultural program and chairwoman of the Assembly Ways and Means subcommittee that handles the art budget, could not be reached for comment. However, Ross Clark, her principal consultant, said, “It’s less than the $500,000 we asked for, but not a total disaster.”

Last year, the multicultural program received $164,000--the same as the year before. This year’s increase will support two grants programs for multicultural arts organizations: $300,000 for established groups and $200,000 for emerging groups.

Deukmejian also left $312,000 (of $383,000 requested) in the council’s budget for its Touring-Presenting Program, which suffered from a severe shortage of funds last year.

However, the governor vetoed $100,000 for a proposed venture between the council and the state Department of Tourism. Reid said that funding proposal wasn’t properly prepared. “In order to achieve our goals of the multicultural program, something had to wait till next year,” he said.

“The new budget is a positive sign of support from the administration,” Reid said. “The governor has to get some credit from the arts community this time.”