Theatre Foundation and COMBO Will Merge Next Year

The Combined Arts and Education Council of San Diego County and the San Diego Theatre Foundation announced Tuesday that they will merge Jan. 1 to save administrative costs and to try to improve donor funding amid intense competition for arts grants.

The new umbrella organization will keep the Theatre Foundation name, but COMBO’s name will continue to be affiliated with two major programs under the foundation’s auspices, officials said at a news conference.

Those two programs became COMBO’s major function when the once-powerful group’s role changed in 1988, from an organization dispensing as much as $4 million in annual city funds to arts and humanities organizations to a predominantly service-oriented group that provides technical assistance to arts groups. It also now raises private funds to support arts groups. The city took away COMBO’s city arts-funding function after forming the Commission for Arts and Culture, which distributes transient occupancy tax revenues to arts organizations, including COMBO itself and the Theater League, the Theatre Foundation’s membership body.

Under the consolidation, COMBO will transfer its assets, including whatever remains of its current $100,000 annual budget, to the Theatre Foundation, which is expected to have an annual budget of $335,000 next year. The foundation will also take over COMBO’s two main programs, Forum of the Arts and Business Volunteers for the Arts.

The 75-member, 3-year-old Forum includes representatives of various arts organizations throughout the county, including museums, dance troupes and the San Diego Opera and Symphony. Many of those organizations also already belong to the Theatre League, the trade association membership arm of the Theatre Foundation. The Forum provides its member groups with a regular avenue to discuss issues and problems facing the arts community, as well as marketing and fund-raising workshops.

“There is no other mechanism at this point in time that brings all the arts organizations together so they can discuss these issues,” said Anita Harbert, COMBO’s board president.

The Business Volunteers group, created two years ago, matches business managers with organizations that need technical management advice.

The primary money-saving benefit from the merger will come from reduced payroll, said Jack Borchers, COMBO’s executive director. COMBO had already cut its staff from three to one, with Borchers as the only paid full-time staff member, and he said he has been taking only half the $50,000-a-year salary. Under the merger, Borchers’ job will be eliminated, but he is expected to stay involved as a member of the Theatre Foundation board.

The new foundation will probably receive less in city funding than the two groups’ combined grants, because of the reduced administrative costs, said Alan Ziter, the Theatre Foundation’s executive director, who will remain in charge of the merged organization.

Ziter and other officials said the merger should be attractive to corporate and foundation donors, who have complained they are so inundated by requests for funding that it is hard to pick and choose among them.

“The last two or three years particularly, they have been so overwhelmed by the numbers of arts organizations in San Diego,” Borchers said, adding that one corporate executive had told him he simply stacks up the requests and “takes the top 10.”

“I think in this era there needs to be combinations, because San Diego just can’t afford the number of organizations that have come into San Diego,” Borchers said. “The consolidation will mean that two historically important organizations will continue together.”

The chances of obtaining funding for the member arts organizations should be enhanced because donors will see just one umbrella organization, said Borchers and Gerard Buckley, president of the Theatre Foundation board of trustees.

“Their support has never been needed more,” Ziter said.

Buckley said the resulting increased funding will also improve the variety and quality of arts programs offered to the public. “There’s better productions, there’s more for people to select from. . . . I think the ultimate benefit is to the entire community by improving access and making theater better.”

Borchers and Harbert were quick to add that both the 28-year-old COMBO and the 9-year-old Foundation are in the black.

“We’re not doing this because we’re in the hole,” Harbert said. “We think it’s sound planning for the future to keep these programs going.”

The foundation’s current staff of three full-time and six part-time employees will be kept, and some of the part-time workers may increase their hours, Ziter said.

COMBO’s board of directors will be disbanded, but as openings occur on the foundation board, those people will probably join, Ziter said.

This year COMBO got about $12,000 in city funds and the Theatre League got $27,000, officials said.

The foundation had already submitted its funding application for the next fiscal year to the city before the merger was finalized, so it’s likely to be somewhat less than is needed to run the consolidated group, Ziter said.

The COMBO board approved the merger last week, and the foundation board voted the week before.

Borchers said the idea was launched in his discussions with William Purves, a founder of the 64-member Theater League. COMBO and the league had worked together on projects before, so “it seemed like a rather natural thing to start there,” Borchers said.

Said Purves: “It is abundantly clear in this time when we have to make two plus two equal five . . . the combination is manifestly wise.”