Autry moves ahead with Southwest plans

THREE years after the Autry National Center took control of the impoverished Southwest Museum, Autry leaders and the Southwest’s Mount Washington neighbors are still having tense conversations about the center’s plans to move most of the Southwest’s Native American artifact collection and to boost nonmuseum uses of the Southwest’s historic but crumbling campus.

But now, for what it’s worth, the debate is down on paper, and there’s a new target date for the beginning of the Southwest campus’ next incarnation -- five years down the road.

On Tuesday, Autry leaders, community activists and the city Human Relations Commission held the last of six public meetings on the subject, and the Autry offered a summary of public input to date: 1,013 pages of opinions, from postcards to petitions, including thousands of signatures demanding that the museum’s collection not leave the neighborhood, and also a humble proposal for a bowling alley at the museum’s hilltop site. The crowd at the meeting was estimated at between 150 and 200.

Much of the feedback, the Autry acknowledged, conflicts with its ambitions for the site. But Autry leaders -- who closed the Southwest galleries June 30 for repairs and conservation of the collection -- say the Southwest’s current setup doesn’t pencil out financially and that they see enough support to stick with their plans for the place.

Autry Chief Executive John Gray said he was “excited and gratified” by the meeting and that he sensed “growing acceptance” of the Autry’s plans.

There was no such acceptance, however, from Ann Walnum, co-founder of the Friends of the Southwest Museum Coalition, which has accused the Autry of “cultural piracy.”

“I am definitely unsatisfied. Two rooms do not a museum make,” Walnum said, referring to a key aspect of the Autry plan. She said the group would meet with community members Oct. 3 to ponder the next steps in their fight against the Autry’s plans.

“We still want to be friends to a real museum,” said Walnum.

Though details about money and the Autry’s prospective partners remain hazy, the center aims to expand its Griffith Park campus, which includes the previous cowboy-heavy Museum of the American West, then move most of the Southwest collection to the Autry campus. Meanwhile, back in Mount Washington, it plans to upgrade the Southwest’s deteriorating buildings and reopen them as a multipurpose site with cultural and educational programs along with two galleries of exhibition space.

The Autry merged with the Southwest, the oldest museum in Los Angeles, after a long decline left the older institution broke, with paltry visitor traffic and on the brink of closure. (The Southwest’s gift shop and research library remain open.) Autry officials said Tuesday that if fundraising, city permits and construction logistics in Griffith Park can be handled as planned, the repurposed Southwest will reopen in 2011. That’s a year later than earlier estimates, Gray acknowledged, but probably a more realistic reflection of the work involved.

The next big step, Gray said, would be the completion of more detailed Autry plans, which he said would be “early in 2007.”

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-- Christopher Reynolds