City Council to Debate $3-Million Cultural Cut : Arts funding: Organizations are scrambling to find ways to combat the reduction, part of a plan to eliminate a $60-million deficit projected for San Diego.

The merits of a proposed $3-million reduction in arts spending will be debated at today’s City Council budget hearing, and the outcome will determine how much money is available to local arts groups and could dictate the scope of the city’s next arts festival.

The $3-million cut suggested by Councilman Ron Roberts is aimed at eliminating the city’s projected $60-million deficit for 1990-91. His proposals include reallocating $4.3 million in transient occupancy tax funds, of which the $3 million in arts funds is a part. (TOT funds come from a city tax on hotel rooms.)

During this fiscal year, $800,000 of that $3 million was used for grants to arts and cultural organizations. The other $2.2 million was used for last fall’s inaugural arts festival, which was conceived of as an event to be held every three years. The festival, which had a Soviet theme, also received $800,000 in TOT funds from the previous fiscal year, bringing the city’s total investment in it to $3 million.

When Mayor Maureen O’Connor lobbied for TOT funds for the festival, she said the arts community would benefit by receiving the money even during years when there was no festival.

During 1990-91, some of the $2.2 million in TOT funds that this fiscal year went to the Soviet arts festival would be used to plan the 1992 event, leaving the rest for the arts community. The city’s Commission for Arts and Culture has earmarked that money for a new, special-projects fund.

Roberts’ proposal, however, would divert the arts funds to other areas, leaving an uncertain fate for the festival and causing a 15% reduction in the grant fund, which this fiscal year totaled $5.1 million.

A coalition of local arts groups has been meeting to discuss strategies to combat the proposed cuts.

“My concern is that the arts money not be viewed in the wrong light,” said Thomas Hall, managing director of the Old Globe Theatre. “People look at the TOT as a subsidy fund and fail to see that, for the dollars invested, there is a phenomenal return.

“The other concern we have is that arts organizations are principally involved in educational and social programs throughout the city. For example, the Old Globe has a program with a focus on preventing dropouts. We want people to look at arts and culture as part of the city’s infrastructure.

“We just want the council not to take the short-term view,” Hall said. “The long-term impact of the cuts will be negative. The arts are a large employer, so if you take that money, you’re going to have more unemployment and less economic stability.”

Mickey Fredman, chairman of the arts commission, said Roberts’ proposal violates the spirit of the TOT fund.

“The City Council made a commitment in return for our support of the TOT increase,” Fredman said. “Roberts is suggesting that they not keep that commitment. This is another example of shooting from the hip without really looking at what they’re saying. It’s self-defeating because of the effect on tourism and the hotel-motel industry.”

Roberts countered by saying: “You’d have to close your mind to the magnitude of the budget crisis to come to (Fredman’s) conclusions. The reality of the situation is, just to continue at our current level of service, we are $60 million short. Nobody else on the council has been willing to reduce the budget anywhere.”

Roberts acknowledged that there are other options for making up the deficit, saying, “We’re continuing to look at several other suggestions that would either reduce expenses or increase revenue.”

As for the continuing festival, Roberts said he isn’t opposed to the concept, just the method of financing the event, which is one of the mayor’s pet projects.

“I’d like to have a festival, and I told the mayor that,” Roberts said. “But in terms of our priorities, it can’t be one of our highest. I supported the festival in the past and I will in the future. But setting aside $1 million this year is not the answer. We have to get ourselves set up fiscally.”

Although the festival board of directors has not formally approved a 1992 event, the mayor, who served as the festival’s chairwoman, has spoken of it as a certainty, and the arts commission has appointed a committee to suggest a theme for the ’92 festival.

If the city doesn’t commit some funds this year to planning a ’92 festival, it could lessen the scope of the event, according to Judith Luther, executive director of the Los Angeles Festival. That Festival, also a triennial event, was last held in 1987 and will take place again this September. The 1987 festival had a budget of just over $6 million, almost identical to that of the Soviet arts festival. This year’s Los Angeles Festival budget is about $4.8 million.

“In 1988, the curatorial staff did a lot of traveling and started to do some fund raising,” said Luther, who estimated the group’s planning budget for that year at $500,000. “In ‘89, the curatorial process continued and was refined. We began to hire staff and raise funds more intensively, again spending about $500,000.”

Luther said the planning process is critical to an event of any ambition.