CARLSBAD HANGS MONEY ON LINE FOR ARTS IN CITY

The concert wasn’t supposed to begin until 5:30 p.m., but a crowd of 75 had gathered well before that on the grass of Magee Park. They had come to hear the New Orleans-style music of the Fro Brigham Preservation Band.

Eyeing the growing throng, trumpeter Fro Brigham, who resembles Louis Armstrong, said “I’m ready” and let the good times roll 20 minutes early with a rousing rendition of “St. Louis Blues.”

To the crowd’s delight, the band’s horn section later snaked its way through the audience playing “When the Saints Go Marching In.” While Brigham and the band cooked up an eclectic musical mixture, the Carlsbad Historical Society did a brisk business selling beer, wine, lemonade, sandwiches and fruit.

This summer’s Friday concert series, which has drawn about 300 people each week, is the first project of the city’s new Cultural Arts Program.

The program is only months old and quite small, but besides San Diego, Carlsbad is the only city in the county with a municipal arts program. On a per capita basis, Carlsbad budgets more money for the arts than San Diego. With a population of 52,000, Carlsbad earmarked $318,000 for the arts, more than $6 per citizen. San Diego allocates about $3.5 million, or $3.50 per citizen.

The Carlsbad City Council considers support for the arts so important that it has incorporated arts into its general plan. The standard municipal general plan contains nine categories. Carlsbad has 10.

The force behind Carlsbad’s arts program is its mayor, Mary Casler. In 1984, Casler got excited about the possibilities of public art when she passed through Hawaii.

“I had to wait for several hours in the Honolulu airport and noticed many art objects placed around the lobby,” she said. With that in mind, she attended a League of California Cities conference on art in public places. Casler came back jazzed about funding the arts by allocating a percentage of the city’s budget for art.

The City Council felt the same way, and in May, 1985, passed an ordinance creating the Cultural Arts Program, funding it through the general and capital improvement funds. For 1986, $112,000 has been allocated for performing arts and program administration, and $206,000 has been set aside for public art, such as paintings and sculptures.

“I’ve always been interested in art. I notice it everywhere I go,” Casler said. “Besides being an aesthetic benefit to the community, it causes the Carlsbad residents to have a joy in their city and to feel proud of it. Having public art is very important.”

Connie Beardsley was hired in February to coordinate the city’s Cultural Arts Program. Beardsley had been director of the Arts Alliance for Hinds County and Jackson, Miss. She created the joint county-city Arts Alliance for its 350,000 residents and watched its budget grow over seven years from $28,000 to $375,000.

In Carlsbad, Beardsley’s first job was to help form a seven-member Arts Commission. Casler wanted a commission made up of “those who not only understand the cultural atmosphere of the community but also understand the people and business.”

The seven members include Wayne Bischoff, president of the Carlsbad Board of Realtors, who has a master’s degree in music; Thomas Brierley, superintendent of Carlsbad Unified School District; Dona Meilach an author of books on arts, crafts and computers; Muriel Roston, an artist and community volunteer who is the founding president of the Carlsbad Patrons of the Arts; Patra Straub a volunteer and member of North County Concert Assn. and Carlsbad Historical Society, and Theodore Frye, retired treasurer of the Rockefeller Foundation. Chairman is Joseph Bear, division manager of industrial products, Hughes Aircraft Co.

The commission chose the jazz series as its first program. “The commission felt that we should have something in celebration of the arts--you don’t want to get so bogged down in the work that you don’t enjoy it,” Beardsley said.

The City Council will vote Aug. 5 on the first public art work recommended by the commission: a 6-by-8-foot abstract sculpture costing $10,000, by James Hubbell of Julian. It would be placed at the Safety and Service Center, the new home of the Police and Fire departments.

“We wanted to start small and work through the process--get familiar with the process--before we begin to make larger commissions,” Beardsley said.

Most of Beardsley’s efforts have been spent compiling lists of North County arts organizations. She has also held public workshops--one so the commission could hear about the kind of programs people wanted--and a seminar on public art led by La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art director Hugh Davies.

Beardsley has been concentrating on compiling lists of arts organizations. “It’s incredible the number of calls you get if people know you have the information,” she said. “I get a dozen calls a day asking do you know such and such, or somebody who works in clay.”

The Cultural Arts Program is compiling an artists registry and a slide registry of artists’ works. A bimonthly newsletter is also in the works. Eventually, as the program grows and sets a track record, Beardsley said, the city is likely to ask that certain new private developments provide public art for community.