State Directs $5 Million to Disney Hall

With $5 million for the Walt Disney Concert Hall authorized by Gov. Pete Wilson as part of his new $75.4-billion state budget, the new home for the Los Angeles Philharmonic is the biggest beneficiary of a $24.2-million state arts assistance package to be administered by the California Arts Council.

“We had city support, and we have had county support, but in the past we had had no support from the state,” said Andrea Van de Kamp, chairwoman of downtown’s Los Angeles Music Center, where the new concert hall will become the fourth performing arts venue when it opens its doors in 2002. “This is real endorsement toward the energies of the city in revitalizing downtown.”

State funding for the $255-million Frank O. Gehry-designed building brings fund-raising totals to $201 million of an estimated $205 million needed to build the hall ($50 million has already been spent on the design process).

Disney Hall fund-raising chairman Bill Siart said the state money “provides substantial assistance to get us closer to our target,” but project officials caution that recent design changes--including the addition of an office structure for the Philharmonic and a performance space for California Institute of the Arts, as well as changing the concert hall’s exterior from limestone to metal--may raise the hall’s current cost estimate. A guaranteed maximum price will not be resolved until December. For that reason, as well as the need to build an endowment for the Music Center, the fund-raising process is continuing.

The remainder of the $24.2-million state arts funding package will be divided among 20 museums. The largest museum grants in the Los Angeles area are $2 million each to the Hollywood Entertainment Museum, the Skirball Cultural Center and the Museum of Tolerance of the Simon Wiesenthal Center.

Including the new package, the California Arts Council this year will receive $44.2 million, with $20 million for this year’s annual grants and operating budget, a substantial increase from last year’s budget of $14.2 million.

California Arts Council director Barbara Pieper said that the assistance package is being presented as a one-time-only act; the council normally only receives a lump sum to be divided among the state’s many arts institutions at council discretion. This year, some members of the Legislature requested “line items” for specific amounts for individual institutions, individually considered by the governor, which were packaged together.

Pieper added that the last time the council funded a line item request was about three years ago, a $200,000 allocation for a jazz preservation institute associated with Cal State Long Beach. “There appears to be a trend in this country that more states are receiving these line items from their legislators,” Pieper said.

While the museums’ funding was supported by various legislators, the request for Disney Hall came from Sen. Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles) following a meeting with Van de Kamp. “They met, and she is a wonderful persuader,” said Polanco’s chief aide, Bill Mabie. Van de Kamp also said the project had the endorsement of Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa, also from Los Angeles.

Polanco was disappointed when several of his arts requests--including $800,000 for the New California Center and $500,000 for the Los Angeles Police Museum, were nixed by Wilson. “A lot of the money that we pursued we didn’t get,” Mabie said. “It’s rough out there--but anyway, Disney Hall is one that we are pleased to see was successful.”