O. C. Arts Groups In the Dark Over Center Rent Rates

Regional groups using the Orange County Performing Arts Center are being compelled to set ticket prices for the 1991-92 season without knowing how much the Center will be charging them to rent the facility, officials of the organizations say.

Center President Thomas R. Kendrick, asserting that basic rents at the Center have held steady for five years, said Thursday that “no decision has been made” regarding the rents. But the Center was faced with a record, $4.52-million gulf between operating costs and box office income in 1990, and officials of most of the organizations say they have been led to believe that a rent increase is forthcoming.

Erich Vollmer, executive director of the Orange County Philharmonic Society, the major sponsor of classical concerts in the building, said he has been “trying to get an answer” on the rental rates for some time and was recently told by a high-ranking Center official that he would learn the rates “when you get your contract.”

Officials of the Pacific Symphony and Opera Pacific said they expect rent hikes but don’t anticipate any resulting problems. But William Hall, director of the Master Chorale of Orange County, and Vollmer expressed concern.

“It’s very difficult to budget for a concert series when there’s a missing ingredient like that,” said Vollmer, who announced next season’s schedule and series ticket prices earlier this week. Twenty-two of the concerts will be presented at the Center.

“We just didn’t feel we could wait” to make the scheduling and price announcements and to print brochures, Vollmer said. Like other performing-arts groups, he explained, the society aims to have its renewal brochures in the mail by early March, before the current season ends.

“We need several months to process all of this material,” he said. “It would have been helpful to have known shortly after the first of year what kind of increase we would be looking at” in rental rates.

Kendrick said Thursday that the Center’s own success is tied to that of the regional groups--independent, nonprofit organizations that take their own artistic and financial risks in booking most of the offerings at the Center. “We have, since opening, sought to foster the growth of our regional organizations through preferential rental rates and scheduling access,” he said. “We are deeply committed to maintaining this position.”

The Philharmonic Society currently pays the Center $2,500 a night or 10% of the gross--whichever is greater--plus related production costs. Its series-ticket prices were increased by about 9% last year. Vollmer said there would be no increase in the published prices for next season, regardless of any increase in rent.

But if the increase is greater than anticipated, he added, the price of individual concert tickets could be raised.

The Pacific Symphony, which pays the same rental rate as the Philharmonic Society, will formally announce its schedule and series ticket prices in about two weeks, according to its executive director, Louis Spisto. He said that ticket prices would rise approximately 4%, about the same as last year.

“Our assumption is that there would be a (rent) increase,” Spisto said, adding that given the size of the symphony’s budget, a rent increase would probably not be “a big problem at this time.” The Center’s resident orchestra, the Pacific, will play 45 concerts there this year.

Opera Pacific, which now pays $37,500 per week to the Center for its performances, plus related costs, will be announcing its series prices for next season soon, according to general director David DiChiera. Series prices on selected seats increased about 5% last year and will increase 7% on half of the seats for next season, which will include 21 performances. Opera Pacific has been the major producer of opera at the Center.

“We have been told there would be some increase” in rent, but not the amount, DiChiera said. “We’ve been expecting it.” He said he thinks the increase will be “incremental . . . it won’t be something so out of line that we won’t be prepared for it.”

But Hall of the Master Chorale said he has had “no indication that there was going to be a price increase” for his organization, and that such an increase would be “difficult to deal with at this point.”

Current costs for the chorale’s four concerts, including one rehearsal for each, are $12,000. Hall said that the Center already is “very expensive” compared to other venues in the area such as the Los Angeles Music Center, Royce Hall at UCLA and the Ambassador Auditorium in Pasadena.

Series ticket prices for the chorale’s next two seasons were set several weeks ago, Hall said, with no raise anticipated “unless there is a major increase in hall costs.”