OCPAC hires fundraising chief

Tom West is the new vice president of development at the Orange County Performing Arts Center, where job one will be raising about $75 million needed to complete funding for the new Renee and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall, along with an additional $11 million or so for annual operations.

West, whose hiring was announced Wednesday, spent the last nine years as a fundraiser for the Kennedy Center in Washington, most recently as vice president of development.

Tumult hit the Costa Mesa center’s fundraising department with several staff departures late last year and early this year, including two officials who, in a rarity for the nonprofit sector, publicly criticized the management style of Terrence Dwyer, who took over as OCPAC president a year ago. Board leaders responded by reaffirming their confidence in Dwyer’s leadership.

-- Mike Boehm

FINALLY

In rehab: Jonathan Rhys Meyers, who plays King Henry VIII in Showtime’s “The Tudors,” has entered a clinic for treatment of alcohol abuse. No further details were provided by the 29-year-old actor’s publicist.

In court: Willie Nelson avoided a jail sentence but was fined $1,024 after pleading guilty to a misdemeanor count of marijuana possession in Louisiana. He’d been cited Sept. 18 after state troopers said they found marijuana and hallucinogenic mushrooms on his tour bus.