Some Officials Dubious on Aid to Arts : Funding: Several supervisors react doubtfully on proposal to help support countywide arts service organization but take a wait-and-see position.

Some members of the Orange County Board of Supervisors sounded a somewhat dubious but familiar note Tuesday about prospects of funding a proposed countywide arts service organization, which made its recommendations public a day earlier. But top county officials also say it is premature to assess those recommendations fully.

The ad-hoc Committee to Form an Orange County Arts Council, which delivered its recommendations to supervisors last week, is proposing that the county contribute $125,000 “in cash and/or in-kind services” toward a $285,200 first-year budget for the agency. Other money would come from the state and federal government and the private sector.

The county, now one of only two in the state without an arts service agency, has been without one since 1988, when the 14-year-old Orange County Arts Alliance dissolved.

County supervisors contacted this week said they want to reserve final comment on the recommendations until the County Administrative Office evaluates them. That office, at Supervisor Thomas F. Riley’s request, is studying the county’s role in arts support and is reviewing the committee’s recommendations as part of the report, Riley said. The study is to be completed April 2.

“There’s not much to talk about,” Riley said. Asked if it was likely that the county, whose support of the arts historically has been close to nil, would fund the proposed agency, he said, “I don’t want to discourage anybody . . . but I don’t believe the Board of Supervisors’ past performance certainly has indicated that (the arts have) a higher priority than the homeless or some other projects.

“I’m really not sure how much support there is today when money for (social) programs is such a difficult thing to find,” Riley said, repeating a position he has espoused in recent years.

Supervisor Gaddi H. Vasquez also spoke of competition for county dollars. “I’m not closed to evaluating merits of (the committee’s) proposal . . . but $125,000 is a significant request in the face of other budgetary demands we have. It will have to compete with other priorities for county services.”

The 27-member committee composed of arts and community officials is recommending that the council be established by July 1 and that it develop ways to substantially increase local funding and arts education, draft a long-term strategic cultural plan, be designated by the county as a “state-local partner,” its official arts representative to the state, and serve other needs.

Committee officials have stressed that county support is critical to the new agency’s survival.

But Charles Desmarais, committee president and director of the Laguna Art Museum, said Tuesday that the recommendations are “suggestions only,” and that he’d “rather not concentrate too much” on the committee’s proposed budget. The committee would welcome any ways the county could help meet the needs of the arts community as outlined in the committee’s recommendations. The list of needs is based largely on information gathered last year during committee meetings attended by more than 175 local arts officials.

“It is our hope that sources of funds could be identified that wouldn’t be in direct competition with money for the homeless, etc.,” Desmarais said. But “if the basic needs we’ve outlined can be met with half as much money, that’s wonderful. We’d enthusiastically support any alternatives.”

According to Gloria Woodlock, manager of the state program for county arts agencies, most of these 56 “state-local partners,” even in “rural and economically depressed areas,” receive some county funding. The committee has applied for $12,500 from the California Arts Council, money it could receive only if designated by the county as a “state-local partner.”

Woodlock also said that $285,200 to launch the proposed agency is a “good start.” But, she added, “in a community the size of Orange County, they’ll have to find additional funding to be able to accomplish anything.”