Arts Center May Fall Prey to Cash Shortage

After 10 years of providing arts programs for children, the popular Westside Arts Center in Santa Monica is in danger of permanently closing due to an all too common problem--lack of funds.

Center officials estimate they need $40,000 within the next couple of weeks to avoid closing. If they are unable to raise the money the class session that begins tomorrow could be the center’s last.

“All we need is an immediate infusion of money to keep going,” says Richard Cabe, development director of the Westside Arts Center. “Then we can continue with our regular fund-raising schedule.”

The nonprofit school offers art instruction to children between the ages of 2 and 12. Its popularity has steadily climbed since it was founded in 1981.

“Enrollment is up. We just finished the busiest summer ever, and it’s ironic that we don’t have the money we need to continue,” says Program Director Susan Childs.

Since the Westside Arts Center receives minimal assistance from corporations and state agencies, its financial health depends mostly on individual donations, which have dropped by more than 20%, says Cabe, who blames a shaky economy for keeping pocketbooks shut.

The arts center has suffered a number of setbacks in the last couple of years. In August of 1989, an arson fire destroyed the center, then located on Arizona Street. After a long search, the center relocated in an unused structure directly under the carousel on the Santa Monica Pier.

Though the city of Santa Monica provided it with a generously low annual rent of $100, the center had to borrow $60,000 to transform the musty, 4,000-square-foot space into the offices and colorful classrooms that now hold the year-round program of classes, workshops and art camps.

But limited parking and problems with crime at the new location put a damper on its popularity. It appeared these problems were solved when the Westside Arts Center became part of Michael McCarty’s master plan to build a hotel and community center on the site of the now-defunct Sand and Sea Club. But McCarty’s plan failed to pass muster with the voters.

The center suffered another blow when its annual auction last November, featuring donated works by such artists as Laddie John Dill, Lita Albuquerque and Robbie Conal, failed to live up to expectations.

“In 1990, our auction netted us over $105,000, but last year it dropped to $15,000,” Cabe says.

That left the center with a drastic shortfall and Cabe with an office full of contemporary artworks.

“I’m still trying to sell these pieces,” Cabe says. Priced between $850 and $1,000, the artworks are available to anybody who stops by his office.