Ventura Symphony Gets Its Ducks in a Row

It was 15 minutes past race time and 5-year-old Peter Pommer was growing antsy.

Pressing his body against the chain-link fence, he kicked dusty gravel into the Freeman Diversion Dam’s channel and eyed the starting line down the way.

“When that big truck dumps the ducks, they’re going to zoom fast,” he said. “I want my duck to win!”

Suddenly, the countdown began, a trumpet sounded and the truck’s bed began to lift. In slow motion, nearly 10,000 yellow rubber ducks toppled into the algae-green water and began bobbing downstream.

“Mine’s the first!” Peter cried, pointing to the lead duck, listing slightly to its side. “If it wins, I want to play with it in the bathtub because ducks go in the bathtub, except the kind with fur.”

On Saturday, an estimated 500 people turned out for the Ventura County Symphony’s rubber duck race, a fund-raiser that had been delayed for about a month because it initially ran afoul of the law.

Under cloudless skies, young children, their parents and others lined the 3,000-foot concrete drainage channel alongside the Santa Clara River near Saticoy to watch the floating carpet of ducks inch down the channel.

Sponsors paid $5 apiece to adopt ducks, which were marked with numbers and plucked from the channel in the order of their finish.

To move the ducks along, officials with the United Water Conservation District, which owns the Freeman Diversion Dam, increased the channel’s water flow for about half an hour.

The lucky ducks that finished first won their sponsors a variety of prizes, ranging from a bolo tie to a three-day cruise to Mexico.

The top prize, a 1994 blue Geo Metro donated by Paradise Chevrolet, went to free-lance photographer Spencer Weiner, 28, of Santa Barbara. Weiner photographed the event for The Times and plunked down $15 for three ducks shortly before the race began.

“I can’t believe it,” he said. “I never win anything. The last thing I won was movie tickets, but I couldn’t go because my 1-year-old was too fussy for a baby-sitter.”

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Symphony officials said they raised about $23,000 from the event, and expected to net about $5,000 after paying off expenses for the race. A total of 4,600 ducks were sponsored while another 300 were given away for free.

“If we break even we’re happy, and if we make money we’re really happy,” said Karine Beesley, the symphony’s executive director.

Faced with an $80,000 deficit this year, symphony officials saw the duck race as a way of expanding their audience beyond season ticket-holders and raising much-needed cash.

In the past, the symphony has hosted more traditional fund-raisers such as golf tournaments, gala dinners and footraces.

The rubber duck race appealed more to young families, Beesley said, because for $5 they could have a stake in the race. In contrast, tickets to gala dinners can run $250 a plate.

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John Conlan and his wife, Patty, said they have never attended a symphony performance. But after hearing about the duck race in the newspaper, they decided to bring their three daughters out for the day.

Initially planned for June, symphony officials postponed the race when the district attorney’s office warned that the race was being promoted illegally as a lottery. To meet state law, symphony officials had to give the public a chance to win prizes without a donation.

And, in the end, only 300 people entered a duck in the race for free.

Lining the canal two and three people deep, some participants took their role as race sponsors more seriously than others.

Twelve-year-old Colin Wilson of Fillmore and his stepbrother, 9-year-old Scott Haviland, had hoisted a banner in the air declaring, “Go Rubber Ducky 33706.”

“In big races, they have signs that say, ‘Go so and so,’ ” Colin explained. “It’s just like that.”

Even if theirs didn’t win, the brothers had no intention of leaving empty-handed.

“We’re buying our own rubber ducks to put in the pool at home,” Scott said.

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The day’s only snag came as the luckiest ducks neared the finish line. But instead of easing neatly into the winner’s chute, the ducks jammed the opening and none could get in.

“Things are not as ducky as they seem,” quipped Glenn Wilson of Fillmore.

An official with the Freeman Diversion Dam came to the rescue. Balancing himself in a rowboat, he hand-plucked the winning ducks from the water.

Jim Kentosh, operations manager of the dam, said the winner’s chute didn’t arrive until late last week. “We never had a chance to test it with many ducks,” he said, “so this was sort of a dry run for us.”