COSTA MESA NEWPORT BEACH : Panel Seeks $130,000 for Arts in Schools

The Newport-Mesa Unified School District is expected to authorize spending $130,000 to expand fine arts programs in schools.

Due to scarce funding for arts programs, some deteriorating equipment has become a safety concern, arts task force Chairwoman Loretta Robinson told the board at its meeting Tuesday.

At the district’s spring choral program at the Loats Performing Arts Center at Newport Harbor High School, for example, the stage started to collapse beneath the 200 student singers, said Eleanor Anderson, the district’s director of curriculum and assessment.

“We had 260 kids on the stage on platforms and risers. One of the platforms on which the risers were placed gave way. It caused the kids on one set of risers to suddenly drop about a foot,” Anderson said. “None of them fell or were injured, but there was a gasp from the kids and the audience as this thing dropped like an elevator.”

Board member Judith A. Franco said that incident in April spurred public support for financing arts programs, in part because the performers were such troupers that they continued singing through the mishap.

“I think the excitement really started with the Music Festival, where we almost lost some children,” she said.

Last spring, the board offered to finance part of the program expansion with interest earned from the Irvine Endowment for arts education. The board asked a task force of 30 fine arts teachers to review the district’s needs and come up with recommendations. Robinson, who was just voted the county’s Fine Arts Teacher of the Year, presented the panel’s findings Tuesday.

The bulk of the money--$71,558--should be used to buy musical instruments to expand music programs at the sixth-grade level and beyond, the panel said. Another $21,900 was requested to refurbish the Loats Performing Arts Center with new risers, stage platforms and high-tech electronic equipment to enhance offstage direction ability.

The panel also requested new pulleys and an inspection for the entire stage rigging system, bracing for electric pipe and ladder cable pulleys, and lighter counterweights for some of the pulley systems as items needed to make the auditorium safe.

Anderson said the music festival incident was a wake-up call to at least replace deteriorating equipment.

“Things like that do happen, but it really pointed up how much we need to improve that auditorium,” she said.

The balance of the funds would pay for teacher in-service training, as well as pottery-making and audiovisual equipment.

A formal request for the money goes before the board for approval Sept. 13.