OXNARD : Council Urged to Keep Museum Open

Members of the Oxnard Cultural and Fine Arts Commission have urged the City Council to remove the Carnegie Art Museum from a list of proposed budget cuts.

Commission Chairwoman Mona Broyles said Tuesday at a City Council meeting that closing the museum to help balance the city’s budget is “totally unacceptable.”

Closing the museum is included in a list of budget reduction options that the council will consider when it adopts the 1990-91 budget in June. The proposed cuts come after the council decided last year to cut $1 million from the city’s budget by eliminating about 15 positions because of a decline in revenues.

Estimates of revenue for the 1988-89 fiscal year were about $2 million too high, and the city had spent $850,000 more than its budget allowed.

The city can save $175,000 a year by closing the museum, said Assistant City Manager John Tooker.

Council members said Tuesday they will try to keep the museum off the budget chopping block.

“A city that is growing must have art. No questions about it,” Councilwoman Dorothy Maron said.

The 10,000-square-foot museum, which houses a permanent collection of 250 paintings and sculpture, opened in 1981 and has a staff of one part-time and three full-time employees, according to museum Director Andrew Voth.