Foundation Tries to Save Arts Center : Proposal: Anaheim group’s offer to buy or renovate old school building, home to various cultural programs, will be considered by education board.

In a last-ditch effort to keep the Anaheim Cultural Arts Center open, a revamped board of directors is proposing to buy or renovate the aging building that serves as the center’s home.

Anaheim City School District trustees will consider those proposals, along with other options for the future of the former school building, in a special study session tonight.

For 20 years, the district has leased the closed school at 931 N. Harbor Blvd. to the city at $1 a year. The center has been home to a variety of programs and events, from folk concerts and community theater to art classes and exhibits. Now, facing severe overcrowding and a budget crunch, the elementary school district wants the building back when the current lease expires June 30.

Directors of the Anaheim Foundation for Culture and the Arts, which administers the cultural arts center, forwarded their proposals for the building last week. Under the first, the district would continue to lease the building for use as a cultural arts center at $1 a year. In exchange, the foundation would renovate the building and would provide arts-education programs to district students at no additional cost.

Under a second option, the foundation would purchase the building (for about $450,000), renovate it and provide arts programs to the district at cost. Under both proposals, the foundation would “help the district locate affordable, acceptable office space.”

School district officials have in mind several possible uses for the building, constructed in 1931. It could be renovated for use as district offices, thus freeing up classroom space at other school sites, at a cost of about $1.2 million (according to a just-completed engineering assessment).

Another option is to raze the building and build additional classrooms for adjacent Horace Mann Elementary School. According to district Supt. Meliton Lopez, it would cost too much to bring the building up to the strict earthquake standards required for public schools under the state Field Act. Also, Lopez has said in the past that the district may opt to rent out the space at commercial rates.

Lopez said the trustees will discuss the center board’s proposals at tonight’s meeting, along with other options for the buildings. In an interview, he stressed that the district’s main goal is easing school overcrowding. The cultural arts center building was first leased to the city at a time when school enrollment was shrinking, but in recent years the district has had to add portable classrooms to cope with increasing demand.

At first glance, Lopez said he has some concern about the foundation proposals. Selling the building outright is not a viable option, he said, because the money would go to the state rather than to the district.

Also, Lopez said the district could not use the center for school-sponsored arts activities unless it were brought up to Field Act standards, and he expressed concern about overall liability issues. Even with a release of liability (under which the Cultural Arts Center has operated for 20 years), as owners of the building the school district would remain ultimately responsible for injuries and accidents occurring there.

Directors of the Cultural Arts Center said they are confident that any differences can be resolved.

“We just believe there’s not a downside to this,” said Al Shankle, board chairman. “It just makes no sense whatsoever to destroy the building.”

The foundation is “ready and willing to put arts back in the schools,” said board member Andy Deneau, noting that arts curricula have been slashed in recent years at schools throughout the state.

One night last week, Deneau said, the center was being used by two Polynesian dance groups, a ballet class, a folkloric dance class, an art association meeting and by a pair of artists installing an exhibit. “The place was pretty noisy and pretty full for a place that’s going down the tubes,” he said.

Many of the organizations have already made arrangements to move their summer programs to other sites in Anaheim, however, in anticipation of the June 30 eviction.

The recently installed foundation board includes representatives from businesses and arts organizations as well as educators. Shankle is an Anaheim-based builder with an interest in historic buildings.

Other board members include vice president Harry Grammer, area manager for ADT Security Systems in Anaheim; Jim Turner, director of guest entertainment for Disneyland; Troy Botello, director of education for the Orange County Performing Arts Center, and Terry Blackley, dean of fine arts for Fullerton College.

Shankle declined to say how much the foundation would spend on renovation but said the project was “well within the means” of the organization.

Deneau said about $500,000, mostly from board members, has been pledged for the project.

Both Shankle and Deneau declined to speculate on options the foundation might pursue if the attempt to keep the Cultural Arts Center at its current location fail.