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HomeMy WebLinkAbout07-13-2017 - CAC - Public CommentsJuly 13, 2017, City Arts Commission Agenda Comments The following comments on items on the Newport Beach City Arts Commission agenda are submitted by: Jim Mosher ( jimmosher@yahoo.com ), 2210 Private Road, Newport Beach 92660 (949-548-6229) Item 1. Draft of 6/08/2017 Minutes Page 1, Item IV, first sentence: “K.C. Susan Cramer questioned whether …” [?] Page 2, line 4: “Commissioner Greer requested members of the CAC provide information about CAC programming at local meetings in the City of Newport Beach as opportunities are available to do so." The Corona del Mar Residents Association holds well-attended meetings of civically- engaged citizens monthly at OASIS. They have a standing item on their agenda for reports from the City’s boards, commissions and agendas. I’m sure they would love to receive a regular monthly report on CAC plans and activities. In fact, in the past I have heard considerable frustration expressed there about the lack of public knowledge of, and opportunities for public participation in, the planning for the rotating Sculpture Exhibition. More recently, I know they were concerned at seeing press reports of a decision having been made to move the Ronald Reagan Centennial Memorial to the Civic Center (see Item 5, below) without any public discussion or opportunity for comment. Page 6, last line: “Ms. Kramer Cramer noted the community supported the concert.” Item 4. Ad Hoc Subcommittee Appointments It would be helpful for the public (and probably the Commissioners) to have a written list of what each of these supposedly “ad hoc” committees is being tasked with accomplishing, and by when. I think it would be evident from that that these are not really ad hoc committees appointed to provide an advisory report back to the main group on a specific topic in a limited time (the only kind of committee free of Brown Act noticing requirements), but rather committees “standing by” to receive as yet largely unknown assignments in the coming year. Such standing committees are required to conduct their business at noticed public meetings. If these were truly ad hoc committees, the members would not all be appointed at the full Commission’s first meeting of the fiscal year. They would, instead, be appointed at random times during the year as the need for a specific advisory report arose, and dissolved as such reports were completed. Item 5. Ronald Reagan Statue I strongly object to the tone and content of the staff report for this item. It suggests that on April 11, the City Council made a routine decision, fully within its powers, to move the Ronald Reagan Centennial Memorial from Bonita Canyon Sports Park to the Civic July 13, 2017, City Arts Commission agenda comments - Jim Mosher Page 2 of 4 Center and that the City Arts Commission’s only role in this, now, is to find a location for it – a matter that can be quietly farmed out to one of the Commission’s standing “ad hoc” committees for a privately made decision. As the Commission must know, the situation is far more nuanced than that. At the April 11 City Council meeting (under Item XII, City Council Announcements), Mayor Kevin Muldoon requested a future agenda item to discuss relocation of the Reagan Memorial. Later at the same meeting, when approval of the contract for Phase III of the Sculpture Exhibition came up (as Item 20), Council member Scott Peotter recommended not only voting to move the “Reagan statue” that night, but to make the approval of Phase III (and future Arts Commission recommendations) contingent on the Arts Commission finding a place for it. The Council proceeded to approve the move, even though it had been acknowledged it was not on the agenda. As a result, no one who had an interest in the matter had the slightest idea they needed to come to the April 11 meeting to make their views known. Not only was this a flagrant violation of California’s open meeting law, the Brown Act, but the decision was made without any environmental analysis or determination, which is also illegal. In addition, the City Charter arguably prohibits the Council from making decisions affecting parks and artistic matters without a recommendation from the Parks, Beaches and Recreation Commission for the former, and the City Arts Commission for the latter. The Council had neither. Adding to the confusion, the official minutes approved by the Council at its April 25 meeting indicate the Council’s April 11 motion was to ask Arts OC (rather than the Commission) to make a recommendation about possible relocation of the Reagan Memorial as part of their Phase III Sculpture Exhibit scope of services. But no such provision was added to the contract (C-8463- 1). While it’s presumably within the City Council’s powers to at any time vote to ask PB&R and the CAC to offer recommendations about the future of the Reagan Memorial, what the Arts Commission has before it seems instead to be an illegal command to support a pre-determined result or face the future wrath of the Council. It is my belief that the Commission should respond by reminding the Council that the Commission is an independent body, separately empowered and expected by the people of Newport Beach to advise the Council on artistic matters prior to the Council’s decisions on them, not after. Under the City Charter, the CAC is presumably expected to render an objective opinion, independent of political pressure, and should not be expected to assume that whatever in it is rendering an opinion about has already been decided. Additionally, under Section D.2 of Council Policy I-9 the CAC would be expected to consult with PB&R before rendering its recommendation, because this is clearly a matter impacting City parks. The CAC’s conclusion, after conferring with PB&R, collecting public input and comment, and supplying its best judgment, may well be that the best move is no move. July 13, 2017, City Arts Commission agenda comments - Jim Mosher Page 3 of 4 In rendering its decision, I believe the CAC needs to inform itself regarding the backstory involving this sculpture, including the intense public outcry set in motion by the Council’s poorly- noticed adoption at its January 11, 2011, meeting of Resolution No. 2011-10, allowing the City to adopt donations for a Reagan statue. The Commission’s February 10, 2011 meeting, with more than 100 people in attendance in the Central Library Friends Room was likely the most highly attended in the CAC’s. Nearly 30 people spoke, nearly all expressing distress over the Council’s adoption of its resolution. Similar anxieties were expressed by numerous speakers at the Council’s February 22, 2011, meeting. The present location and dedication of the memorial in Bonita Canyon Sports Park was hence the result of an extended and contentious process that it might be wise to leave undisturbed. My personal reasons for thinking the memorial should not be moved include the following: * Mayor Muldoon’s stated reason for wanting to move the memorial was that it was neglected and subject to vandalism. I believe a more prominent location would make it more of a lightning rod for vandals, not less. In addition, compared to the bustling Civic Center, the present secluded park setting seems to me more respectful to the memory of a fallen hero and more inviting of the quiet reflection that a memorial is presumably intended to inspire. * The other rationalization, seems to be that a prominent memorial in Newport Beach is needed to educate and inspire visiting schoolchildren. It is unclear to me why Newport Beach, as a city, would be undertaking that function when Mr. Reagan’s legacy is so much better and more inspirationally accessible at his Presidential Library in Simi Valley. * Beyond that, the idea of honoring a political person only tenuously connected with Newport Beach, and thereby glorifying a particular political ideology in the Civic Center Park, seems fundamentally incompatible to me with the idea of municipal government being non-partisan and equally welcoming to residents of all political stripes. * In view of that, the memorial may be (and is) seen by some as political propaganda, not art. The perception of art as propaganda – a perception the CAC may wish to avoid – is enhanced by placing it in proximity to government offices. * For those enamored of the Reagan mindset, it's difficult to see how a public expense for moving the memorial can be justified: it is spending hard-earned taxpayer dollars on something unrelated to the core responsibilities of city government. The original idea of Resolution 2011-10 was that the memorial, whatever it might be, would be funded by private donations, the public aspect being limited to assistance with financial administration. Since then, the City general fund has apparently been used for repairs, maintenance and security. That the public will now be asked to spend additional public dollars on a partisan cause is worrisome and wasteful mission creep. Finally, the staff report's implication that the Commission's final recommendation can be delegated to a small committee working in private is also worrisome. First, as indicated under Item 4, above, the committee is clearly a permanent standing one, which the Brown Act requires to meet only at noticed public meetings. Second, the City Charter places its responsibilities on July 13, 2017, City Arts Commission agenda comments - Jim Mosher Page 4 of 4 the Commission as a whole, not on individual members or committees. Hence, the committee's recommendation, whether arrived at legally or not, needs to be publicly debated by the entire Commission before possible submittal to the Council. Item 6. Clarification on the Newport Beach Arts Foundation Reorganization Staff Report In my view, the City Attorney’s role is to advise the City on what the law is, not to dictate what its policies should be. The present agenda item is especially bizarre in that it seems to consist of staff notifying the Commission that the City Attorney has changed an action taken by the Commission at its last meeting without the Commission having any say in the matter. The Assistant City Attorney’s objection to the Commission does not seem to be that he thinks there was anything illegal about it, but rather that he thinks the Commission’s action was unwise. In particular, the Commission appears to have voted to participate in the restructuring of the Arts Foundation in such a way that future meetings of the Arts Foundation, like those of the Commission, would be subject to Brown Act noticing requirements. If Assistant City Attorney Torres does not like that, he is free to notify the Commission as to what he believes the unintended(?) consequences of their vote will be, and he can, like any other citizen, ask the Commission to reconsider its vote in light of his policy advice. But I do not believe he is free to substitute his judgment for the Commission’s, and unilaterally, after-the-fact change what the Commission legally voted on, simply to conform the result to his own personal policy preferences. Mr. Torres seems to think doing something that will require the Arts Foundation to confine its business decisions to noticed public meetings is a bad idea. The Commission may well have a different view of that, either feeling that noticed public meetings are a good idea promoting transparency, not a bad one, or that the advantages of the structure proposed by the Commission outweighs the small burden it places on the Foundation. Either way, it should be the Commission’s call, not Mr. Torres’s.