Editor,
Johanna Felder’s recent Village Laguna letter criticizes the new cultural arts plan — on method, conclusions, recommendations. She makes good points.
The city can, as Johanna suggests, be more proactive with local arts organizations. That said, the new challenge grants are wonderful. Bravo!
But her comments cheap-shot the idea of an arts center. An idea tossed around for nearly 20 years. You’d never guess from her letter —
“… the plan’s recommendations seem to be almost solely based on opinions expressed in a community survey in which 40 percent of the respondents do not live in Laguna Beach … The plan recommends against considering the movie theatre as a possible community arts venue, yet it proposes a new large cultural facility with no location identified.”
Why is the theater not an option? Beats me. But come on. This idea wasn’t plucked from thin air. Vision 2030 suggested it 16 years ago. Thousands of locals participated in Vision 2030.
This new plan despite worts is what it claims to be: a companion piece building on Vision 2030.
Consider affordable housing. We used to at least pay that lip service. No more. Another excerpt from Johanna’s letter —
“While we question whether constructing new artists’ housing is either desirable or financially sound, we support programmatic ways and subsidies to assist our artists to stay in Laguna: ideas that come to mind include ‘fringe festivals,’ the use of empty retail space for popup shows, expansion of the farmers’ market to include art, vouchers for housing, grants for supplies.”
Good luck on those subsidies, grants, vouchers, fringe festivals and pop-up shows in empty spaces. Meanwhile nothing will happen on affordable housing with VL calling the shots. That’s a recipe for fewer local artists.
Our community should more actively support the arts. Arts education. Performing arts. Visual arts. Our venues can’t accommodate locals’ rehearsal and performance needs, nor readily attract top talent.
If the quality of what evolves here can enrich our cultural life, and it draws more people in, I can live with that. I say this as a 40-year resident.
Village Laguna doesn’t get due credit for some of what makes Laguna special. Small scale development. Open space. Right on. And old news. Now they aren’t discredited enough for more recently fighting positive change.
We know what VL is against. What are they for? i.e., beyond tired platitudes of “village atmosphere” and “art colony?”
Sam Goldstein, Laguna Beach
