Parks, Arts, & Community Services Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay, good evening. Welcome to the Arts Commission meeting of Thursday, 06/05/2025. I now call this meeting to order at 06:04PM. We will begin with the Pledge of Allegiance. Commissioner Duderian, would you please lead us?

Please stand. Put your hand over your heart. Ready? Salute. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. You may be seated.

Next order of business is roll call. Ms. Fetua, could you please call roll?

Let the record reflect all commissioners are present except for Commissioner Ashendorf.

Thank you. We will now move to this evening's presentations. Tonight we have two presentations. We will begin with Art in the Park presentation by the Coastal Corridor Alliance.

Thank you for having us tonight. My name is Brett Babos. I am the Deputy Director at the Coastal Corridor Alliance.

And I'm Astris Perez, the Project Coordinator for Arts and Parks.

And our organization is a non profit conservation organization. We're the ones who led the fight years ago to preserve the Banning Ranch property, now called the Randall Preserve. So, for those of you who don't know, it's the oil fields and last remaining open space between Newport and Huntington Beach right there along the Santa Ana River mouth. And our organization is in the process of turning that into, with a lot of partners and a lot of support, Orange County's newest nature preserve. So, in the meantime, we're engaged in quite a few conservation restoration and education opportunities in the community to engage community and sort of enhance the importance of conservation activities in Orange County.

And we came up with a crazy idea of spending months collecting trash from the Santa Ana River mouth and turning it into a giant community led art project. This is an example of that, and my friend Astris here is going to tell you a little bit more about the project.

So, from the beginning, our goal has always been to make stunning art, and now I'm going to tell you a bit about what that process has looked like for us. So, for us, we collected trash for five months from the Santa Ana River mouth. We hired an art director, and we created templates, a variety of templates, also cleaned and organized the trash, and have also partnered we have multiple partners on this, but one of our major partners being Wanano Band of Mission Indians and a Hoshman Nation. And their culture has been a huge influence on the templates and art that we're creating. Another thing that we have made sure to do is engage the community, both disadvantaged communities and also underrepresented organizations, communities.

And all this work and effort has led to us and our events being at max capacity at each point. We're always pleasantly surprised by the lovely residents of Costa Mesa, Huntington Beach, Newport Beach, and Santa Ana who come out to our events. And we've been able to engage them in the ways that were beyond our imagination. One of my favorite memories was recently we were a part of twenty twenty five Love Costa Mesa Day. And there, there was a teenage mother well, teenage daughter and mother, and they were telling us about how they really felt at ease at our event because the mother was predominantly a Spanish speaker and the daughter loves art, and they were finding it difficult to find opportunities in which they could both enjoy themselves and also feel represented and seen.

I, being a Latina, am representation for them. They knew that they could speak to me. One of our artists is also a Latina, and they felt that support from us. And it was a lovely day, and they just spent the entire day making art, and they're already signed up to come to another event with us. So, through that process, not only have we made amazing memories, but we've also created stunning art. This is just, as we said from the beginning, just an example of something our art director created, but our participants have also made things just as stunning. And our ultimate goal is to create a 10 by 20 foot mosaic that will travel all throughout Orange County, and it'll be the backdrop for our conservations for it to come.

That's our first music video. So, like any endeavor, we've had a

lot of amazing partners, including the city

of Costa Mesa. We just want to do a little shout out to a few of the people that have helped significantly, and one is the Fairview Park Administration in Costa Mesa. Kelly Dalton and his team have been amazing in helping us set up art studios once a month in the park. We wanna do a shout out to our friends at We Are Trellis for their help bringing support to our project and all of our participation in Love Costa Mesa Day, to our friends at Coastline College, to Phil Marquez at Santa Ana College, and his gallery support, and to our program partners at the Hasheman Nation. So that's Adelia Sandoval and Heidi Lucero, who've been instrumental in bringing their cultural sort of stamp to our art project to help influence this art.

So, I just wanted to shout out to those folks publicly. And as you can see from our video here, we're looking for something substantial at the end, probably a 10 by 20 foot mosaic that we hope to tour Orange County in some prominent places. And we just wanted to present this to the commission, number one, to say thank you for your support in all of this, and then secondly, just to start the wheels turning about what partnerships we might not know about that you might suggest that we engage with, what funding opportunities we might seek, and what things we might not know that we don't know that could help something of this level engage more community, have the greater conservation efforts of cleaning up trash, and then just promoting some beautiful art. So we just are here to present that and see if there's wheels or synergies that we can wheels turning or synergies we can access.

Yeah.

And now that you all know about our wonderful mosaic, we would love to invite you on October 4 to Santa Ana Art Walk where it will be making its debut.

Thank you very much.

Thank you. I did want to state, and I'm Commissioner Wondrchuk. I think you

can see it. Commissioner Wondrchuk, I believe this is a moment for Commissioner questions. Okay. And if you have a comment about the safest further comment.

Okay, fine.

Thank you. Thank you for the presentation.

Are there any questions?

Are there any questions for him? Commissioner Mann? Hello.

My question is, you're part of the coastal corridor, which I know backs up like I lived near 19th And Placentia back there. So I know all about the Banning Ranch and the whole thing. For a decade or more now, I'm watching all that play out. And I love the conservation effort. Where do you do these exactly? You obviously do them on the beaches and in the parks, right? And how much do they approximately cost to do one?

So, we collected trash primarily from we did a couple cleanups for we got a bit of trash from our restoration events that we hold at Fairview Park in Costa Mesa, And then a majority of this trash came from our beach cleanups located at the Santa Ana River mouth, Newport Beach. So that's where we got most of the majority of the trash there. Where we hold our events, that's at Fairview Park. Yet again, we're situated there every third Saturday. And as for the cost, are you asking for the cost to create one of the pieces?

Because in in staying with our values as an environmental organization, all of the trash, we repurpose it. So, the trash that you see in the art is constantly reused. So, you're seeing people pin it, and people pin the trash, and then at the end when they're done, we take it all off, organize it again, and people continue to use it. So, cost wise, it's pretty cost effective, I would say. And also materials wise, we're not throwing anything away or have constantly get new trash, because we're not officially gluing anything. And then we're photographing it, which is what you

saw as well. And you have an art director, you said, right? Yes. Does that have a fee for the art director, or is that just

Yeah, so received a grant from Parks California for this whole endeavor. And so a lot of this was piloting the opportunities, and we haven't right now costed out how much each of these art installations cost. We have eight of them total, and so we're halfway through. And a lot of the initial funds were just sort of building the program, buying the infrastructure. We have art tents that we do the art underneath, and tables and infrastructure.

So a lot of went to that, and a lot of the money went to staff time just to figure out how to do this, right? So I think in the future if we were to do this, kind of hopefully I'm answering your question, but if we were to do a pop up art stew in the park, it would be fairly nominal. So our art director, we paid a few thousand dollars for her services to help direct this, and that's how that works. But now that we know how to do this, we're kind of experts at it, and we can do it for we can do these any place. That's kind of where you're

going, Yes, yes. Absolutely. Thank you.

Thank you. Commissioner Ford.

Do you have an estimate as to how many pounds of trash you collected to create these installations out of curiosity?

We have bags, been doing it by bags because a lot of, fortunately or unfortunately, a lot of the trash we're collecting is from the Santa Ana River Mouth and we pick it up, it's soaking wet, right? So the water weight really adds to it. But how many bags did we collect?

And it's also been by volume because it's been by bags. So it's been what? I would have to check our number

once Yeah,

have to

check, but it's hundreds.

Yeah.

Yeah. And also too, not all of the trash we collected was something you'd want to touch, right? So a lot of the stuff you pick up and like, oh boy, that certainly shouldn't be in anybody's hands or can't be cleaned. So we then sorted through it and picked out what was looked like could be made into art and people would want to touch and what could be cleaned.

Yeah. If I had to estimate, our gallons are about, we have bags, they're about five gallon bags. So I remember in our report it's probably at least like 100 gallons that we have of trash.

So how do you clean it? I mean is it soap water? Like what do you do?

So that was the less glamorous part of this job, for sure. And what we did with that was we used distilled vinegar. We let it soak for thirty minutes, also trying to find something that was, yet again, environmentally friendly and didn't want to have something. We're already in the process of removing oil rigs from Banning Ranch, so we didn't want to use something that was oil based. So, research found that white distilled vinegar and soaking it for thirty minutes, soak, and then rinsing it off was a good way to

sterilize trash and clean it. So you mentioned about 100 bags of that. Where are you laying that out? Do you have your own office or a building for this?

Yeah, we have a storage facility and sort of a work yard.

Okay.

So we clean out there. And like we said, not everything we remove from the beach. So part of our restoration and conservation activities is continual trash removal from the Santa Ana River mouth. So that's been ongoing. And that will keep going. But for this project, we just got out the nicer bits of trash, cleaned them and stuff that we could turn into art. You can see from some of it here, there's stuff here

that's Or in the video, there are portions where I was surrounded by bags of trash. That was me sorting through We didn't take 100 gallons of trash to our storage unit. At each event, I was going through it and taking out what we thought could be potentially good pieces of trash. If that's an oxymoron, I'm not sure. But interesting pieces that we felt could make good trash, and then those bits we'd separate it. The other bits we'd leave it there. Well, some of trash bags of course we picked up, and then we cleaned what we deemed could make interesting art.

Okay. Excellent.

Thank you. I do have one question. If we want to participate in the next MosaiQ workshop, when does that take place and where?

So our next one is June at Fairview Park, and thank you for asking that. Appreciate it. We expect to see all of you out there. It's actually really fun. People come out and they think, oh, this is going to be a twenty minute, thirty minute endeavor, and we've had people stay all day. And the feedback we're getting, which we think is neat because it's unexpected, it's just therapeutic. They're out there at the park, there's an art studio, there's artists or art directors and they're guiding people through some amazing imagery and they get to go home with, hey look what I did today. So it's a 9AM Fairview Park and you can go to our website at coastalcorridor.org and sign up for one of our time slots. And if not, just come out. We'd love to have you all.

Thank you so much for your presentation.

Thank you very much for having us.

I have

just one more question. How many people approximately are involved in either one project or all of your coastal corridor?

So are you talking about this art project or about our organization as a whole?

Both.

Both. Okay. So in this project, Astris is our project coordinator. Right now we have a staff of six people in the coastal corridor alliance, and we have a team of interns and volunteers. We have two artists that we've hired as part of this project, and an art director.

So there's probably and a photographer, and so at any one given time there's probably 12 or so of us hosting the art studios. And then for our organization, that expands sort of exponentially as our endeavors expand because we have a lot of program partners. So for instance, on the Banning Ranch property, or now the Randall Preserve, we're partnered with the programs or the property's title holder called MRCA, or the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority, they're a state agency. And we partner with them greatly and their staff in sort of the stewardship of the property. So there's a lot of us working towards this.

And so there's also possibilities for you guys to get grants or monies from Arts Commission, City and Parks, and just a lot of other places to grow this specific

Project. Yeah. Yeah, one of our designs here is to get this into schools. So as a project based learning component, we're looking at a lot of the Title I schools. And just to sort of visionize, we think it'd be neat to have children collect their own trash and learn about the conservation of that trash collection and also learn about some of the animals and flora and fauna that inhabit this corridor. Then come to the park on a weekday, maybe we could bus them there and come to the park and they'd create their own trash mosaics that have pictures to take home with their parents or something to place in their school yard and learn conservation through art.

Thank you.

Thank you. Appreciate the So

we want to thank you for coming today because the artwork is absolutely beautiful. And to know that it's a conservation of recyclable trash and things of that sort, I think that's wonderful. You did ask the question of other grant seeing places that you can find additional funding. Have you tried the California Arts Council?

Yes, and I'm not sure. The reason I hesitated is because I'm not sure their association with California Parks, the place where we got the grant.

They're separate from the California Parks.

Then we will look, so

thank you. Okay. Yeah, that's a great place. Being artists, they definitely support art in general. But this is a project that, as you're talking about the conservation, it's making an impact in the community. It's something they would most likely fund. Well, thank you look

into that.

I appreciate it.

You're welcome.

Thank you all for having us. We really appreciate the opportunity.

Thank you for entertaining our questions, and Laurette will follow-up with a couple of our comments.

Thank you. And we'll see you all Saturday, right?

Okay. Next is the Costa Mesa Skate Park Expansion Preview presented by Ms. Villasenor. Good evening, Chair and Commissioners. Tonight, we are going to show you the Costa

Mesa Mesa Skatepark Skate expansion video that was presented at some of our outreach meetings and our PACS commission. We wanted to bring this forward so that you guys have an idea of a potential possibility for an art project in the future. I do want to state that the skate park is in its final stages of the construction phase and will be going out to bid soon for final construction, but that doesn't mean that we wouldn't certainly be looking for a phase two incorporation. This project is funded by a grant which has a deadline, so we are looking to make sure that we meet that deadline, but there has been interest across all parties, both this commission, our PACS commission, and by City Council to incorporate art into this project. So, we are exploring some different avenues for funding and partnerships, and we will very much likely be bringing something back to the commission at a later time to discuss what kind of our component that's going to look like in the future.

So, with that, we're going to show you the video. So, with that video at PACS, we had the consultant present, was able to walk through some of the elements. I wasn't even gonna attempt to try to explain what some of them are called, but there has been you know, it will look mostly like that, but is double in size. Our skate park is currently 15,000 square feet. It's gonna be doubling to roughly double, you know, 30,000 square feet.

It's it's going to be a large attraction for the skate community, one of the newer skate parks developed in Orange County with the first concrete pump track. I don't know why I lost the words. And so it will definitely be a destination. And so the interest to incorporate arts into the City Of The Arts destination skate park only makes sense. So, like I said, we'll be bringing back, hopefully sooner rather than later, some examples and something for you guys to discuss about what something in terms of artistic, whether that's sculptures or incorporated into later designs.

We do have the there's a building in the parking lot, and maybe Ashley can help me with the name of the muralist on the building. Joshua Madrid, who painted, and so there's that on the outside. And I believe they touch it up every once in a while. You know, it's already people already kinda know that there's an artistic element out there, and it's just we hope to expand it very soon. So, the construction hopes to be for the expansion part, hopes to be groundbreaking sometime starting in September.

And so hopefully before that groundbreaking hits, we'll have something maybe that we can discuss in terms of an art component. And with that, that's the presentation.

Thank you, Ms. Villasenor. Are there any commissioner questions at this time? Only questions. Commissioner Mann.

Okay. I love the skate park. My kids skated their whole lives. It's so awesome. I'm so excited right now. Anyway, I've been seeing so many different places where we could put different kinds of art there. It looks so different than the current skate park to me. And you're right, the only art there is that one building. And luckily, that's there because that lets you know where to turn in and go. There's dog park and then skate park.

But it brings so many people in just the skate park that's there now. Making it bigger is bringing a lot more people. So I'm thinking that I know we had talked before at another meeting possibly about there being a budget for something at was it at this skate park? And we were talking about moving that and using it for something else. But I'm wondering how much that budget or how much is the budget for the art here, and how many mediums could we possibly use art mediums in this area?

So a budget for art at the skate park for the project itself not available at this time. There was for this project, because it was grant funded through County Supervisor Foley's office, it's very specific about the size and what it can do and maximizing the potential for the most amount of elements that we can incorporate into new skate park features. The video that you saw, you see a lot of concrete in it. It concrete, but you don't see the fencing there. We're still determining what the fencing looks like.

The current fencing is in, you know, not the greatest condition. And we're still determining. You know, we don't have a few sidewalks since this video was taken about what that looks like and what the exterior looks like and what the landscaping around it is gonna entail. A few of the elements have gotten changed with some additional input. So, we're still working on a final plan, but the documents are about 90% done.

So they're looking to, once those are finalized, immediately release an RFP for construction. And like I said, because of the grant deadline, they're trying to make sure that they stay on task. But I don't think that this group or, in fact, staff is forgetting about the fact that we talk about it. Those conversations of arts in our projects is happening, and so we're continuing that progress. We look to have something happen within this summer season, I guess you would say, for us to figure out what that looks like.

Again, like I said, we're having some initial partnerships and exploring some, whether that's businesses and funding streams that are outside of just general fund. And I think I've mentioned, I'm not sure if I've mentioned that the city launched its first ever sponsorship deck. So, we're soliciting sponsorships for all our events. And even there's a page in there dedicated to like a public art. They wanted to fund public art. So, we're creating those avenues. It's in its first year. So, you consider it's a baby. So, it's evolving. But we hope we're starting to make these first initial contacts with people who have funding, who want to contribute to the community, whether that's through events or through art.

So, we hope to have a I hate to say the word robust, but, you know, kind of a catalog of donors, you know, soon as we build those relationships.

I think you're probably going to end up with some especially for that, because I live in a totally skateboard surf area, and that's all anybody to do and make art for. And I'm thinking a lot of it could probably be just art for art's sake. A lot of people would probably donate a lot of stuff, artwork, whatnot there. And I know they have a whole area around the skateboard.

Commissioner Mann? Love all these comments, but we're going save this for the comment.

Is it comments?

We're doing questions. Sorry.

That was a question.

Thank you.

Yeah. So just to follow-up on Commissioner Mann's questions, just so as we're continuing to go forward in the future and awaiting a future conversation on this, what are the sort of art types that you're thinking of or perhaps the services or different things that we might just consider as commissioners to be able to suggest come future conversation?

I mean, really, I would say the world

is your oyster, as they say it right.

That it could be sculptures and commissioned art pieces, or it can be architectural, whether that's into a new existing fence line, or creative bench types. So, think that it's gonna be vast, the possibilities, but when that time comes, I think we will be able to bring some examples that have been incorporated into the other skate parks across the country. In fact, across the world, a lot of skate parks incorporates artistic elements. And so, we'll kick that, start that conversation with some, here's some examples of kind of what other skate parks have done, and begin that conversation there. So, if that makes sense.

Yeah, great, thank you.

Hi. I have two questions. The first is you mentioned that the groundbreaking would be in September. When is the anticipated completion date?

So possibly in September, hopefully, pending the timeline for RFPs and constructions go, you know, the best possible scenario. And then, you would look for once they did a groundbreaking, whether that's September, possibly October, you estimate, I would say, for 15,000 square feet in just my general experience, right? I'm not a contractor or anything and anybody in public works, but for a size that that you would I would say minimum six months. On the optimistic side, pending no delays, you would say, you know, give it nine months maybe. So, look at that time frame.

Thank you. The second question is you'd mentioned partnerships and reaching out to both grant people and to corporate partnerships. Have you made efforts to reach out to Vans and Monster, in particular, given their ties to the skate community and that type of

We have some preliminary conversations with some people in the action sports industry.

Thank you.

I do have one question. Will the skate park maintain a relationship with Volcom? I think it's known as the Volcom Skate Park at present.

So again, we're reaching out to all of our action sports industry leaders, especially the ones that are here in Costa

Mesa. Great. Thank you. If there are no further questions, I will now open to public comments. Is there anyone in the chamber that would like to line up at either aisle?

Before you begin, I should read this. Each member of the public will have up to three minutes to speak. We will begin comments with those of you in council chambers.

Thank you. So this is, for me, very unexpected, this my presence here. And I was walking this morning in the Brentwood Park till where I moved a couple of months ago. And I'm an artist and designer and event coordinator. And, I love outdoor art and I love nature.

And, I used to work or collaborated with the city of Huntington Beach Huntington Beach Tree Society, which I just briefly mentioned to Mr. Gruner, too, that they're doing a really great job in maintaining the idea connection with nature through their fundraisings and through their work. They hired me for Norma Gibbs Butterfly Park. And I have created some beautiful artwork there for the ground. And it was interesting how they treated the area which they had vacant from the trees.

You know, they cut the trees, they had like eight vacant circles. That park, on its own, is an example of what the community can do when one person, in this case Leslie Gilson, gets really passionate about turning a totally derelict area into a beautiful and treasured park. And so, I just thought actually, I was encouraged to come today to perhaps offer some suggestions because I know the Brentwood Park is there is certain vision the city has for to improvements or remodel. And, I ask a few questions in the park, Mr. Gruner, if there is any concept, some conceptual ideas.

Because, the city wants to get input from people. But a lot of times, people really don't have the idea what they want. If you show them that, okay, this is going to be better, but then actually I found out that this will be presented on the next meeting. So, I was just thinking that maybe I can throw in some idea.

Thank you for your time. If there's no one else in the council chambers, we can go to Zoom. Ms. Fatua.

Chair Ochoa, there are currently no members on Zoom.

Thank you. Now is the moment you've been waiting for, Commissioner Mann.

Thank you. I'm so excited. This is all so great. I loved the presentation that the Coastal Corridor gave, and I think that checks off all the boxes for me and what it envisioned for community art and the Arts Commission and what we'd like to put out there. I think that's a great project. And I love our skate park. Like I said, my kids grew up there skating there. I've hung out a lot there. There's a whole park area around the skate park. And then, of course, now my husband plays pickleball all the time over there.

There's so many places for art there and so many different kinds, like different mediums. I think it's going to be very exciting to escape that. I don't even know what you'd call that, when you just curate the whole entire thing. I think it's going to be absolutely wonderful. And it sounds like a great big project.

And I almost think it doesn't have to be too expensive either, because a lot of people want to be involved. And especially in the skate stuff. That's just so big out here. So I love this because we were having a big thing last meeting, weren't we, about we need more art, we need more art, and this could be a lot of art. And I wanted to thank you for coming in and what you had said.

Oh, I also went to the Psalms Of The Canyon. It was awesome. It was so great. I don't know when the guys were coming back or if they're going to come back or anything, but that was really money well spent. It was so great. It was very popular. My kids came, my husband we all went, and it was packed. And it was really wonderful. That's all. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Mann. Commissioner Lucia?

Two items for me for the Coastal Corridor Alliance. I really want to thank them for coming today and presenting to us. Think that it's incredible work they're doing in the community and I can't wait to go out to Fairview Park on the twenty first to see it in action. I invite them to apply for our arts grants in the future. I think that they're a really great candidate for what we're looking for as far as beautification for the community and community impact.

And then last item, I just wanted to give a shout out to all the staff who worked on the arts crawl. It was really enjoyable. It was focused on music in the city of Costa Mesa, and it was quite an eclectic experience. We started off at a recording studio where we got to meet a producer who had worked for Sublime and a bunch of other bands. He specializes in reggae. We were able to see a young band there recording that day. Then we went over to the Wayfarer, and we were able to hear a heavy metal band doing sound check, which was really interesting and fun. And then the evening capped off at Segerstrom Center for Mozart, so a night at the symphony. I was really impressed with the programming, and I really can't wait for the next one. So thank you.

Thank you Commissioner Lucia. Commissioner Wondershuk.

Just wanted to remind everyone of Make Music Day. That's gonna be June 21, and that is where we're going to be celebrating music in general. So just with what you had shared about your great art walk, we would love to have all of us as commissioners be present. It's only from 11AM to 2PM in Lions Park, and the whole point of that day is literally to celebrate music, making it in any way, shape, or form, whether it's playing a drum, playing a kazoo, shaking a shaker, or singing. We would just love to have everyone come out and the city to come out and celebrate Make Music Day because it's just gonna be beautiful.

So again, Lions Park, June 21, 11AM to 2PM, And I definitely expect to see Mr. Ford there singing some solos. So we want to just thank you for that and look forward to seeing you there.

Thank you, Commissioner Wenderchuk. Commissioner Ford.

Thank you, chair Ochoa. Three things. First of all, I wanna echo commissioner Lucia's comments about the coastal corridor alliance. To take something that's as unsightly as trash and to make it into something beautiful is truly remarkable. And I applaud them for their efforts, and I look forward to the commission supporting their efforts on a go forward basis.

Secondly, we have a lot of exciting opportunities and exciting events that are occurring over the next weeks and months through the city of Costa Mesa, and I would like to discuss or brainstorm on ways that we as a commission can perhaps coordinate our efforts to promote some of these events a little bit better. I love hearing about these and knowing about it, and I'd love to be able to share it more. And I think if we all work together, we can make sure that everyone in our respective circles of influence can know about it and have greater participation, which is beneficial for everyone. And then finally, during our last meeting, we had talked about study sessions, specifically as it relates to finding alternative sources of revenue. We had talked about the TOT tax.

We had talked about alternatives to the cannabis tax. And I'd like to revisit that and see how we can go ahead and do that because I I do think that given the limitations of the Brown Act and the limitations of our time here on the dais, these are things that require more time than we have available here during a regular session. And so I'd like to talk about coordinating that with staff and creating those opportunities. Secondly, for the second study session, Vice Chair Dedarian had talked about the MURAL project as it relates to the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the United States next year. And I was struck earlier this week as to how fast this year is going.

So I anticipate that the time between now and 2026 will be here before we know it. So the sooner that we can get a study session where we can discuss the parameters of it, funding, specifics, etcetera, I think the better off that we would all be. So with that, I thank you very much for my time.

Thank you, Commissioner Ford. Commissioner Durian.

Thank you so much. I just want to say thank you to staff for passing along our exciting proposals to to city council after last meeting. I know there was a lot of discussions every which way from the public and otherwise. So I I appreciate that and and was excited to see at least consideration from city council and from the public on these topics and specifically, you know, what I I had proposed or and and what we suggested to council, which was the public private mural project. I look forward to an exciting update on the budget.

I know there's been a long effort in March, perhaps we should say, forward to get that passed, and so I was up until 11:30, no midnight Tuesday watching everything. Good to everyone that was up here on the dais. If there's any council members watching, good on you. I did want to raise one point about the the budget process, and I know there's a lot of conversations happening around commission powers and responsibilities and just everything going forward. Obviously, a lot is changing within the city itself too, and a lot of conversations are occurring along those lines.

One of the things I noticed just as the conversation occurred, there's the study session that happened two weeks ago, if I have that right, or three weeks ago now, and then of course the meeting on Tuesday here. But to raise the point, in subsection f, and I know I'm becoming the guy who's always quoting the municipal code, so forgive me. But in subsection f of twelve seventy five, which is the portion or the section of the municipal code that lays out the powers of the commission. It reads, in its, meaning the Arts Commission, discretion, we have the power to review the annual budget as presented to the city council and advise its, the city council, on the current operational needs and long range plans for arts opportunities. So I understand we were presented the arts master plan.

That's fine enough. I totally get it. And the budget that was within it. And so we had made recommendations based off of that, and I recall the conversation being specifically to try and keep it neutral in what was being proposed. And yet, the numbers that were then shared during the study session I found to be completely different. And I'm not saying that this is the fault of staff here or staff elsewhere. I don't know exactly how all these things work and what the exact process is for the budget, if it's just the parks and community services on behalf of the arts kind of saying, this is what we'd like. And then finance says, okay. Fine. This is what we're gonna give you.

Or however it works. I understand there's a lot of complex things going on in in the midst of an already chaotic time from from other factors. But just looking at that, you know, we were told that we were going to request 457,000, which included SmartCamp. The number that was then presented was 417,000 for the arts at large. 237 of that was reflected for programming. And that reflected all the costs that I kind of went through and counted up in the master plan for the various programs that we already do and discussed. And then 180,000 or just thereabouts for salary. Again, all fine. I get it. This is the way it works and this is what we're working through.

But the way in which it was proposed made it seem that the Arts Commission was proposing additional $150,000 to the Arts budget. So rather than just requesting that 457,000 that we had discussed here, the number I think on that page that I there's a slide that was presented during the study session, said that we were requesting $567,000 which is a market difference, I think, and one in which as it was presented to city council members made them say, well, why would Arts Commission want to do that? That makes absolutely no sense. And the response was, yes, these proposals would put us further in the hole. And again, just to say, you know, I'm not pointing fingers here.

I just want to raise this issue. I know there's conversations happening as we continue to try and really figure out what it means for the commissions to exist, what their powers look like. To raise this as a part of that conversation, hopefully we get the city clerk here soon or there's some trainings as to what the municipal code means and and what exactly our powers are. I'm very excited about that as you can see. And and I just wanna ensure that we're following the law first and foremost of the city and our ordinances that kind of govern these bodies.

So that said, I'm very much so looking forward to our our staff update shortly, and I'll shut up quickly. The only other thing I wanted to mention was that I was able to attend Love Costa Mesa Day, which was a lot of fun, a wonderful project. I got to go work at the high school and do some gardening with my children. And we came back for an exciting artistic performance, which was really I mean, was a real joy to watch. And just for the record, I have to say this.

My daughter was called up on stage in the kind of urban dancing, urban arts, whatever. I forget the group, so forgive me. But there was a group at the end doing break dancing, they called my daughter up. She ran up on stage after going back and forth with me and my wife, and went into a handstand and fell on her back and quickly ran off the stage. But I was proud of her enthusiasm and attempt at breakdancing and just enjoyed really seeing that kind of artistic and cultural celebration alongside celebrating our city. So with that, thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Vice Chair Dedarian. December was a full month, I'm just going to quickly kind of run through all the things. First, thank you, Ms. Gardner, for organizing the recent art crawl. It was great fun. It was so fun to see Commissioner Lucia and Commissioner Ashendorf there. It was fun and engaging and eclectic. I'd like to congratulate the Give Some Foundation for another successful Songs of the Canyon. It was fantastic all ages events, tons of families. I saw commissioners from planning packs and of course the arts commission.

Commissioner was there rocking some cool shades. Just kudos to everyone involved. It was really well organized and well run. I had the pleasure of attending the Newport Mesa Unified Art Showcase at OCC across the street. It was incredible to see K-twelve students showcasing their work and celebrating with their families.

And I'd like to thank teachers and staff who support these young artists behind the scenes. And on the topic of mental health, I guess May is Mental Health Awareness Month. I was excited to see Art Safe Spaces and Selena Mendoza putting on their annual IKEA event last Saturday. It featured spoken word, live painting, a panel conversation moderated by the Planning Commissioner, Angelie Valarta. The event provided health resources and art experiences to our community, and it was super fun.

I'd like to thank Coastal Corridor for their presentation this evening. I think we're all kind of really excited to see and participate in their upcoming events. It really resonates with me transforming something discarded into something beautiful. There's real poetry in that. And I'm looking forward to World Make Music Day.

Let's see. Oh, and I just want to thank you to the commissioners and vice chair for sparking such lively conversation the past few meetings. I think these are exactly the seeds that we need to kind of nurture as we move forward with the new master plan. From staff, I'd like to request that we agendize viable options for the next iteration of the master plan with an emphasis on best practices. I'd also appreciate a review of identifying any gaps or uninitiated items from the current plan, along with an assessment of staff capacity.

I think this information will be critical in guiding us towards a direction that will best serve our city. That is it. Happy Pride Month, everyone. Next order of business is consent calendar. All matters listed under the consent calendar are considered to be routine and will be acted upon one motion.

There will be no separate discussion of these items unless members of the Arts Commission, staff, or the public request specific items to be discussed and or removed from the consent calendar for discussion. Tonight we have one item, approval of the minutes from 05/01/2025 Arts Commission meeting. Ms. Fetua, has this item been pulled for discussion?

No. Okay.

I will make a motion to approve the minutes with one correction. Page seven, Commissioners Mann's comments, the second sentence. Her pronoun is she instead of he. Could I get a second? Sure.

Sure.

Okay. Thank you. Everyone

may vote on the dais. Can we try having everyone submit their submissions again? Motion carries to approve six-zero with the amended

Thank you. The next order of business is monthly report from our art specialist, Ms. Gardner.

Thank you, Chair Ochoa, and good evening to the Costa Mesa Arts Commission. This is my art specialist update. So, the first item, obviously, is the art crawl. I thank you for Commissioner Lucia, for making some comments, and Terre O'Toole. I'm glad they had a good time. So, just a few pictures I posted up here. As you all know, the art call happened on May 24. We had three different stops, as was mentioned, the 17th Street Recording Studio, the Wayfarer, and a musical production at the Renee And Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall for a performance with Pacific Chorale and Pacific Symphony, Mozart's Requiem. Excuse me. So, while we did this event, we also had, which we do at every event, we had a trading card game, which is really fun.

It kind of gets people to socialize. And the trading cards for this one were musical instruments. So, it's kind of fun to learn about all the different new ones. I come from a background of arts education. So, I always try to add a little element of that in these events. So, and then also, let's see. When they do play the game, they also get prizes at the end. That's what I was going to add. That are musically themed. So, just for you to know.

So, we had 28 participants this year. We had three staffers, and we had the three shuttle stops. And then we had I always send out a final survey to people who participate see how they like the event. So we had 19 people out of 28 fill it out, which I thought was great. And before I go to the next slide, I added some quotes that people put in their surveys.

And I just want to say, I was so surprised at all the lovely things that were said, and I did not make any of these up, I promise. So I just wanted to there was a bunch of them, but I just I thought a lot of them are really great, and I felt like they had some great comments and kind of loved the connection between these different musical spots. So I just kind of put some on there for the screen. And then but overall, yeah, really, really great event. And we're happy to do another one.

We haven't decided on the theme for next year. But I'll let you all know. And it'll probably be around the same time for next year, for twenty twenty six. Sometime in the spring is what I'm thinking. So, the arts grant program calendar. This is something I mentioned at the last meeting, and Commissioner Ford made a mention about kind of being on the same page with events. So, I'm hoping this will kind of help with that. And so, what we've done is I don't know if I can I'm gonna see if I can bring this up for you.

I don't know if it'll do it.

Okay. So what Megan and I, the arts assistant, have done is we've created this calendar on the website. But what we're doing is we're if you click on the select calendar, a little icon on the top of this calendar, we're making lists so you can kind of find out. Because I know it's a lot of information. So basically what we're trying to do is have all Costa Mesa Arts event, if we can. We're trying to be very ambitious so you can kind of look at the calendar and be like, wow, these are all the things that happen in Costa Mesa. And then also, we added a tab for City of Costa Mesa Arts and Culture events. So, anything city sponsored, anything arts grant, grantees. So, what I'll do is I'll try to we'll try to keep that updated, and then we also put the school district arts events. So, I'm hoping this can be a place for you all to go to kind of look.

And we're still kind of populating a lot of it, But you can definitely kind of just click on, let's say you just want see all the city events, and we don't have a lot up here yet. But if you go, you can see like the Ballet Folklorico is an arts grantee. So that's like, that's something. So, you can kind of scroll through the months and see what's happening there for that. And I'll do my best to kind of populate the Arts Grant page, too. So you can see those in like a text calendar format. So, we are just continually trying to kind of put information in one place, because I know there's so much going on all the time. So, just wanted to address that. And then, so, adventure, we have the application is currently open online. The link is on our website for the applications.

And we are extending the youth application as well. We only received 10 applications from the earlier application period, so we'll just keep it open with the adult one and see if we can get some more from that. And then we've kind of started our outreach process. So, you know, putting it online at Spark OC, email blasts, social media accounts, city newsletter, the spotlight, print flyers, and then Costa Mesa Minute, as I mentioned. I mean, if anyone wants print flyers for the call for artists, please let me know, I'll be happy to get those for you, too.

And exhibition spaces, real quick. As you all know, Charlie Groh's artwork is up, and then we have William Gunn, who is coming up next, and I think he's also a photographer. And then for the youth art wall, Parks and Community Services program art will be displayed throughout the summer months. We'll try to do that every year so you can all see what parks is doing too for arts for kids. And as also mentioned, we have free park performances. So, we have our Make Music Day, as Commissioner Wundertzek mentioned. So, that's also June 21. I put a little kind of image here. We have four performers signed up already, and so this is kind of the roster right now. And this is just a day for people to come make music, and to come and enjoy music, and have like a picnic at Lions Park Event Lawn.

And we'll work towards we're trying to get a couple more performers, so we're definitely trying to spread the word about that too. So and I've been working with Commissioner Wondercheck on that. So she has some great ideas surrounding performers as well. And then poetry in the parks. I know there have been some questions about poet laureate things happening, and what's happening, and what's coming up.

So, for this one, we have we're working on this project called Poetry in the Parks with Danielle Hansen for a launch in August 2025. So, Danielle will be creating a poetry experience for five different parks in Costa Mesa. People will be able to consult a map and a QR code to access these experiences at each park. So, each park will have a unique experience that's based on that park, like what's in that park. Signage for the new program will be posted in the park kiosk boxes. So, I kind of put an image of what those look like. So, they're all a little bit different at different parks. And we have one at the senior center too that's out in their kind of patio, so we're gonna put one there too. I didn't have an image of that for this. But these are the list of the the parks that we'll be in.

And then we'll also create kind of a map in the kiosk with like kind of a poster and a QR code, and people will be able to use their phones to kind of pull up a web page with all kinds of information like a video of Danielle reciting poetry that's related to that, maybe a lesson or activity. And so we're really excited to see this kind of launch as a first kind of program for Danielle Hansen as our poet laureate. And then public art. So we have utility boxes are coming up. They should all be finished by the end of this month.

So you'll see about 12 of them, and I'll definitely bring back images of all the new ones in August when we return for meetings. And then, also, I had a quick update about the Chick fil A mural on Newport Boulevard and 17th Street. I know I've had some questions about that. So, the images here on the slide, this is an artwork by Noah Elias, I believe, or Elias. So, currently, we're working with Economic and Development Services Department to apply for the correct signage permit.

Because this mural had logos on it, it's considered to be a sign. They're working with them to kind of I think what they decided is they'll remove the logos and then have them fill out the mural permit and then come to the Arts Commission present this. I just wanted to let you all know that that's in the works. Hopefully we'll see them soon for that. That concludes my art specialist update for the month of June. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Gardner. Are there any commissioners who have questions at the moment? I actually have one question. Is it possible to perhaps promote the Poet Laureate programs during the summer, perhaps July 3, just to kind of get the word out there that she's going to be participating at these parks and that might help increase our outreach efforts.

Yes, that's a great idea. We'll get I'm working on a poster and some kind of outreach materials for that. And we I forgot to mention this as well. We're working with Matt Vito. He does he's their multimedia specialist for the city, and he's gonna help us kind of do some promotional things to promote that as well. And then if people participate in this program, we'll I think we're thinking of giving out some free tickets for the free at Segroship Program for people who complete it or, like, do the hashtags or connect themselves to the social media accounts, city social media accounts. So, we have some things in the works, but yes, I think having like a print flyer to promote it, we can definitely do that for events that are upcoming.

Madam Chair, if I can just add to Ms. Garner's presentation here. I do want to give an update on the budget on what happened on Tuesday. As you know, the council reviewed the proposed budget for fiscal year 'twenty five, 'twenty six. And in that budget, it was proposed as to continue funding the fifth year of the master plan.

And that is what was approved by council. So the recommendations by the commission was not considered at that time. But there will be future opportunities to present some other changes or recommendations within the midyear budget review process. So the total funded amount, as Commissioner Darien mentioned, is the $416,990 And that is basically the current master plan for the fifth year, with the exception of the smart cam only being funded at $60,000 And that was pretty much the funding allocated for the last four years. And the council went ahead and did that again for the next fiscal year in 'twenty five, 'twenty six.

Thank you, Director Kruehner. I guess we're opening it to the public if there's anyone in the chambers with questions or comments. Are none in the chambers. Ms. Patua, anyone on Zoom?

There are no members currently on Zoom.

Thank you. We can now open it up to comments from the Commission. Okay, I see no commissioners. So

can I ask Director Gruner, what was the status of the master plan update? And for my own understanding as I was looking at it, where was that included? Would that be in a separate parks and community services line item that it was requested? Just because I was trying to figure out how that worked within the actual numbers itself.

Yes, that is correct. So the finance department issues out a it's a pretty large booklet with all the different departments and all the different divisions and different line items for each item within that budget. And so in parks and recreation, there's a line item that says arts master plan, and that was proposed to be funded basically as it was represented here in the master plan back when council approved it about four years ago. So they went ahead and approved that amount that was allocated back back then.

Yeah, I understand that part. But I mean for the master plan renewal piece that we've been discussing. Was that an incentive in that or was that a separate

line up? No, that's a separate line up. And actually, funding that was requested that was not included in that funding process, we did ask for $35,000 to be included for a future master plan development. And that was not included. However, I think that we can certainly try to find the money that is required, if it is required. As the chair mentioned, looking at August and having something agenda ties in regards to what the new master plan is going to look like, that will be the appropriate time to also consider what kind of funding that we would need for that.

Great. And then just one question, I guess, just in the details. I was trying to understand because, again, I'm just seeing the I looked through the packet, kind of figured out where the master plan or the arts and culture line items were. We requested 457,000 per the master plan request, right? What was previously laid out in that budget. The number that we had was $4.16. As I mentioned, the way it was broken down there's that operations, I think maintenance line, was $2.37, if I have that correct. And then 180 for salaries. Obviously that's base salary plus benefits and stuff. How does Smart Camp fit into that?

Would that have been in a different line item? Just because I'm curious how exactly there's 60,000 more on that staff salary line item than we saw in there. So I'm just trying to understand exactly how that breaks down and what that looks like, if that makes sense.

Yeah. There's a little bit more detail of a breakdown per line item, and the Smart Chem has its own line item as do so many other of the different arts programs and components that are included in master plan. Okay.

All right. That makes sense. I understand what happened there. Thank you. I

just have a couple of comments. The calendar looks great. I really appreciate staff kind of populating that with events and having it color coordinated is really helpful. And then the other comment I had was I forgot. So we should move on. I will email you later. There are no further comments? Okay. Then I guess we can move to receive and file. Okay.

Next order of business is old business arts grant program review guidelines. Ms. Garner will present.

Thank you, Chair Ochoa. So real quickly, so for this agenda item, we're bringing back the arts grant program review of guidelines. The changes I made to the document in your packet since we started this discussion a few months ago have been highlighted. So, as requested at last month's meeting, I made a small change to the rubric to give extra points to small arts organizations with financial needs. And then, I also brought back some examples from other cities of their arts grants, programs, and missions, and objectives for the Arts Commission to take a look at as requested.

And there's, I think, there's five examples, including ours, the city of Costa Mesa, there's five examples. So, we can kind of open this back up for discussion about that mission statement, the objectives, and see if we can kind of suss out any changes and edits that you all would like to see. Thank you.

Okay, at this time are there any commission questions? Okay, Vice Chair.

Sorry, thank you so much, Ms. Garner. I really appreciate you putting together these program examples. I just had two questions, both on this and on the ordinance, or one each, I should say. Did you get a sense or the extent of funding that the other cities put towards these programs?

I did not look them up specifically. I do know off the top of my head, obviously Carlsbad, because I worked there, that's about a 100,000. But the other ones I didn't. They were just cities that were kind of comparable in size, and Santa Ana obviously is bigger. But I think they, a couple years ago, Santa Ana gave away, like, they had ARPA funds that they used, and it was like 300,000, which I don't think that's a normal year for them, but I still think their arts grant program is fairly high. And I I don't know exact number at this time.

Okay. Yeah. That's not a problem. Was just curious. I was Yes, looking of at myself, and yeah, was trying to figure that out too. And then my other question, so we have this example of a historic document of the policy that the council had approved, I think back in the 90s, if I have that number correct. Yeah, '91. Is that a current effective policy? Am I understanding that correctly?

Yes, because it has not been changed or updated, so it stands, yeah.

Great. That's all my questions at this time.

Thank you.

Any other commissioners with questions? No? Can we open it up to public comment? No one in the chambers? Okay, Zoom.

There are no members currently on Zoom.

Okay. Any comments from commissioners? Have comments, but I'll wait. Vice Chair?

All right, I'm back on. Thank you. Okay, so I was just examining these documents. And again, thank you so much, Ms. Garner, for taking in our suggested changes and our discussion last time.

I think a couple points stuck out to me as we were looking or as ours, I should say, I was looking through the other examples. And the major one being that the majority of them seem to be focused on expanding public art and partnering creative partnering to advance creative economies their cities. And I thought that was an interesting focus that I think ultimately I would like to see us take with these art grants and really focus. Because we're not doing too much otherwise given the current budget that we have in funding the creation of new art so much as doing accessibility in art education. I think just as a general whole, if you look at that $457,000 that was put forth and funded in various ways.

So I would like to see that change, but at the same time, I think that's a deeper question for the purpose of the grant program. And perhaps that would do better once we get a little bit more data on this year, and then of course, enter in a larger discussion about the master plan going forward and what we'd like for for the arts in the city in that that kind of larger context. So I'll I'll stop pushing on that as much. Think for this moment, at the very least, perhaps once we get into the master plan discussion, I would like to raise that. And then also, I think Commissioner Lucia last meeting made a very good comment or suggestion that had me thinking as I was reviewing these materials, is about the issue of venue access for some of these organizations.

And looking at the council policy, if you all want to pull it up, can. Number two, and the purpose so it gives a little background on the purpose. It says set forth minimum standards for considering requests for financial and other support for such organizations, meaning cultural and artistic organizations. Number two under policy lays out what support means, which means it lists out the use of city facilities. Now I wonder, I don't know if it would be the right time to put this into it, if we want to have a and I'd welcome discussion on this, of course, from other commissioners.

But perhaps we might consider including some sort of policy that allows free access to city facilities to grantees. I don't know. I'm sure we would need some input from staff on that, and perhaps if there's a certain limit that we can only meet if we're saying, well, this should be free for these orgs to have events, say, at Lions Park or

May I interrupt, Chair? Did you want to make a motion at this time?

I don't know if I wanted to make a motion. Was just raising this for conversation.

Okay.

If that's okay. But I'm just trying to raise it because I think we could do something like where within the policy itself or within the guideline, excuse me, and the application process, there might be something in which they check off that says, we'd like access as a nonprofit organization to be able to host our events or programming in x y z place, city facility, free of charge or something like that. Or we might have a rolling offer that allows x number of hours per year, either for each five zero one kind of cultural organization to be able to apply to us or to request that, and we'd be able to approve that in one way or another, whether that's just through staff initiative or coming before the commission. But I just wanted to raise this as an actual possibility for us to really consider what would that look like. Because I understand, for instance, we have gifts coming up and saying, well, we want 2,500 for the urinals so people can use the restroom while we're having this event.

I'm But sure they had to get permitting and pay various fees, I imagine, to do the performance in Canyon Park. Why wouldn't we then just say, well, is a wonderful program for our community. Can we figure out a way in which we can additionally subsidize that without saying, here's another $2,500 but allow that to happen in a way because it is, I think, a public benefit. But I I welcome staff comment on that as well as other commissioners' thoughts and feedback.

I could just chime in on that kind of request that from what I gather, you can set a qualifications factor that says they qualify for a fee waiver. The director of parks and community services has the ability for certain it meets certain criteria to waive fees for certain facility rentals or special event permits, gathering that they meet certain criteria of what an event is. So, stuff like the Songs in the Canyon is really great. We really extensively review that. That has gotten larger and larger of an event over the past few years.

So, it would still have to go through a special event permit process. But, I think, absolutely, as a commission, you can set a qualification, and then that it would be eligible to be reviewed by our Parks and Community Services Director as a fee waiver.

So if I understand this correctly, if I can just jump back in, no one else wants to, what we could do is say, you can request this as a part of your application, And then if we approve your request, in some sense that would go on then to the director for them to make that kind of assessment and approval rejection. Is that correct?

Yeah, that's correct.

Also if I can add, like Ms. Garner said this the last meeting, previous commission meeting, we're looking to put that actually into the application process. And so an applicant would know in advance how that process works, how exactly the funds would be weighed if they choose to use you know, a park or a facility that is a city. Thank you.

And if I can just add real quick too. I just want to make the commission aware that the council with the budget approval last year, they granted us an additional $10,000 and that was not granted this year. So we have the $12,500 to work with for next year.

I just had a question. And I like the idea that we would have public facility use for grantees. But would we put a limit on how many days or a specific date, like how many? Because I'm thinking if it's theater, some theater people might want a whole week and take, you know, I need rehearsals for five nights and then do four performances. So I'm just asking what do we I guess we can have that at a later discussion since you're mentioning we can have qualifications that we would set. But it could really it could expand a lot further than just a one time event, if that's what you were thinking, is all I'm saying.

Correct. And every event is unique in nature and where it's held and what they're doing. So everything basically come down to a case by case scenario when we review songs in the canyon, they need porta potties and restaurants, and that's a requirement put on us because of how many eventually, if it continues to grow, will they need additional traffic enforcement or parking? Every unique event has different circumstances.

What was I going to say? So perhaps I might be stepping far ahead of myself here. But just thinking through what a process might look like then, would we say that you could apply like within the application, could check box, say, I would like to request access to x y z facility for our performance, our project, special event, whatever it might be. And then we would have, of course, the review committee review it and adjudicate and have a list of selections that would then come before us for approval. Would those lists go to the director before coming to the commission?

Would we approve and then send it to the director? I know that's a very technical question, I'm just trying to think through how do we do that and then and thus, like, what the process would look like that we try to implement.

I would think it would it would go to the review panel first, and then they would provide a recommendation on what should occur, whether there's a fee waiver before it would come into my office.

And then that would come to the commission, correct? Okay. Yeah, great. So I guess my question to staff then is do we need to make a motion to implement this thing? Can we it sounds like this was already happening or in discussion. What would be a best use or help at this moment?

Can I chime in on that really quick? So are you saying that every time somebody is going to request a space that it has to go through a review process and then through the parks and then come to us at each meeting?

I would just say annually. So when we do the whole process for arts grants, like for example, the way I'm envisioning it as an administrator is putting something in the application, putting something in the handbook. People can check like a box like, yes, I'm interested in venue space or something. You know, we can kind of come up with what that looks like. But then, then we'd go through the normal process.

Like, it will go to review panel to look at the applications kind of, you know, more in-depth. And then they would come to the commission. Know, and then to Brian, we'll talk about it with staff, like after that, after approved by the review panel, then Brian could take a look at those and see if there's any venue requests and what is our action on those. And then they would come to commission with all those details with like, hey, this is the arts grantee and this is what they've requested. This is their amount that we've decided on. Does that clear things up a little bit? Okay.

Yes. I just wanted to make sure there wasn't a really long crazy process for each, you know, like if there was a small request or a big request, you know, depending on what it is.

This time, do we make a motion to approve? I'll make a motion to approve the arts grant application with the new edits.

I'd to second the motion. It's not letting me select a

second. Make a motion.

Oh, sorry. Oops.

You may vote on your dais. Motion carries six zero to approve with the new edits.

Thank you. The next order of business is new business free at Serkerstrom Center Campus. The final report for fiscal year twenty four-twenty five. Ms. Gardner.

Thank you, Chair Ochoa. So, is our final report for the Free at Segerstrom Center Campus. This kind of our last show is going to be next weekend, and we have all the tickets claimed for that, so we're at the tail end. So, I just kind of wanted to bring back kind of what we did this year administratively, and then some key takeaways. I think that's all in your report.

Do we do you guys want would you like to

see a PowerPoint? Do you want to see images or anything? Or do you is the data sufficient in your reports? Okay. Just let me know if you need more information. Yeah, so just a few changes that we're making to that based on kind of what I received this year. Basically, what we'll do for next year, the big differences, and just kind of changing some of the numbers, We had a lot of people that came to shows more than once. I would say I had some people who came to like eight to ten shows. And then I had some people who went to one, obviously. So there was a really broad range of people who, you know, had the time to go to them and kind of figured out, like, how to apply and when things would pop up where.

I tried different outreach efforts. You know, I sent them all to the nonprofits first to kind of give them, like, a week or two of time to sign up first before opening to the public. So I tried different things. So I did that. Then I would do outreach to the public, and sometimes I would reverse it. I felt like I was getting a lot of repeats from the nonprofits. And so I just tried a bunch of different things. And so the key takeaways are basically based off that, kind of what I experienced. And so, I would say that the majority of people who, you know, use the tickets were Costa Masons. And I would say like 80 to 85%.

But we did have people from other cities that used them. Again, I left it pretty open. I didn't, I wasn't very severe in who applied. I wanted to make sure tickets were taken. And I would say we didn't have huge wait lists for them. So I think as a new program, it's still kind of picking up momentum and, like, people are learning about it, that we have this offering. And then the biggest thing I think I'll change for next year is the calendar. So what I was doing was releasing shows like a few at a time and just kind of so people didn't know the whole set calendar for the year. And just like this year for next year, we'll have a calendar from October to June with shows during that whole time. So about 30 shows that people can get tickets to.

So what I'll do for next year is I will create a full calendar for the year that people can view and see what's there. And then people will be limited to how many shows they can go to for the year so they can kind of pick and decide and get a look at everything. And then kind of pick on four shows. And then I'll open registration links like a few weeks before each one and kind of put dates online for everybody to kind of, okay, I really want to go to the show, so I know the application opens. We'll make it kind of a first come, first serve thing.

But I'll try to kind of provide all the information up front, and then let people kind of pick the shows that they'd like to go to. So, I'm hoping that kinda, you know, works a little bit better, and then limitations so we can kind of expand outreach as well. But also still giving, you know, priority access to kind of nonprofits and people who don't get these opportunities that often. So but then, you know, we'll also be kind of exploring with social media campaigns and stuff with I've also talked to our multimedia specialist, Matt Vito, and we've talked about some things regarding that as well. So just some big you know, a few changes for next year.

Is it question time?

Questions from the Commission. Commissioner Mann.

Hi, thank you. So I love this program, and I think it's great. All these organizations are phenomenal. I also was wondering, is there any way to get them to donate these tickets as opposed to us paying for them? I know they're just they seem to be bigger organizations. They have dedicated fundraisers and people who make a lot of money for them. Are they nonprofits? I would be so surprised if they were nonprofits, because

they're very big, right? Yes.

So, Commissioner Rand, they are all nonprofits. They are large nonprofits. We do have the funding to pay them. So, yes, while I understand they're large organizations, I think the way I look at this program is it's the tickets are for the public, but we also want to create partnership and support to our organizations here in Costa Mesa that do a lot of great work for the city and make us the city of the arts, I think. So, they do discount.

Like, I think a few of them waive fees, and they do kind of give us a discount on those. But I think the point of the program, too, is kind of twofold, right? It's like for people in Costa Mesa to enjoy things that they may have a barrier for, you know, typical on their typical day. But then also to kind of show support for our strong organizations that really make us the city of the arts. And they've been around for a long time kind of doing this on their own. So I that's kind of the way I view it. And so I you know, yes. But, yes, they are all nonprofits and yeah. Yeah.

You know, just it would be great. I know we're this is kind of in creating a partnership with them also, doing this and possibly for other things for us in the future with them. But yeah, if they could donate like half the tickets, that would be awesome for our budget. But yeah, it's a great program. All right, thank you for answering that.

Thanks for your question, Commissioner Mann. Anyone else? Commissioner Weinerschuk.

So I just had a quick question with the particular events because you have tickets for four tickets for here, three tickets for there. Not three tickets, but three events, it sounds like, right? What are you

reading?

So I have on there five events per So it would be like October to June. They can go to five different performances, and then four tickets for each show, and up to four tickets

for each show.

So, do they get to select which shows? Or are these it's pretty open for any particular show?

Concert? It's actually a curated list. So, I kind of work with each organization to pick some, you know, programs to kind of give a little bit of everything that they do. So, for example, off the top of my head, for Siggersom Center for the Arts, there's like a Broadway. There's a dance production. There's kind of a more youth oriented production. Same thing with South Coast Repertory. We have like a youth show. We have a, you know, more adult shows. I try to, you know, sprinkle in some kid things too, more cultural experiences as well. So, we try to just kind of make sure it's a nice mix of things that people have all different tastes for that. Yeah.

Vice chair.

Thank you. Think kind of along the same lines of Commissioner Mann, I completely understand that these are nonprofits and like any good program we ought to pay these tickets what they're worth. That being said, one of the interesting things and I'm not trying to attack any of these organizations, they're all fantastic and I'm glad they're in our city and certainly want to go to more of their performances but one of the things that strikes me is some of them are grantees. And I don't know you know, it just feels like a funny bothand thing where we're both giving them grants and then we're also paying them. And perhaps they're the ones giving us discounts.

I'm not sure, and I don't know if there would be some sort of policy or approach we'd want to implement or could implement. It just seems more of like a point I'm raising. But I don't know if you've given that any thought, Ms. Garner, if there's any kind of factoring into that, the discussions that you have with these organizations.

Yeah, so I believe a couple meetings ago we talked a little bit about that. So when we were talking about the arts grant, and this can continue to be a discussion as well. If we want to limit, this sounds weird, like, but I've heard people use the word double dipping. Like, if we're giving this amount to them, then they can't apply for this. And I have seen arts grant programs do that. So, I mean, I'm open if that's something you feel would be useful. Like, okay, so let's say you participate in one of our other arts and culture master plan programs, then you wouldn't be able to receive grants. I've seen things done that way. I think when we talked about it last, we you all chose to kind of talk about the financials, right? And then kind of give less points to people who maybe have a larger budget, right?

And so it kind of knocks down their score a little bit. So I think that's where we went last time. It doesn't mean, you know, this can't be discussed again, or if you want to think about it, you know, for next year, or when we start talking about the new arts and culture master plan as well. That could be something. But yeah, I mean, if you're interested in that, we could have a discussion about that too. Yeah.

I feel like I have a comment to say, I want to make sure I can dip into that or I should shut up for a minute.

No, I agree with what Commissioner Drudarian and Mann had just mentioned about that. And I would like to see us have that discussion with the next master plan because I'm even looking at the Orange County Museum of Art. It's free to attend there, but we're paying $10,000 for an arts education workshop. I know the workshop is a little bit different than walking through the museum, but the museum is free. So if the 10,000 could go towards something else that, you know, we would like to see happen within the city, I think that would be wonderful, but that's just a comment that I would have. Thank you.

I have a question. Is it possible to get data on the demographics of who these tickets are actually reaching, just to kind of help identify the needs as we look forward to the next iteration of the master plan?

So, when I have them fill out basically, the only thing I've asked is the zip codes, their name, and email, just for privacy reasons. But and I have all that data. So, that's kind of where that the Costa Mesa versus other Orange County city comes in. But, I could definitely kind of find out like which organizations and who's public. I know who the senior center folks are. But, I guess I'm not sure exactly what you'd be looking for other than like zip code or organization.

I think more organizational. Okay.

So my question is, you have a list, you have a table here of all the organizations. Are the tickets going to them first as it says on this list here? So it is going to them first, and then whatever Yes. Is available is so that's who you're probably speaking of, who who are the remaining tickets going to. Okay, all right. Thank you.

Okay, if there's no further questions from the Commission, we'll open it up to public comment. Anyone in the chambers? There are no one here in person. Anyone on Zoom? Ms. Patua?

There are currently no members on Zoom.

Okay. Public comment is now closed. Is comments for the Commissioner. Commissioner Wondrchuk.

My apologies on that sound you heard earlier. I was looking up some information for us. This month is two things. It's Black History, Black Music Month, African American Music I can say Black. Music Month for African Americans is the month of June, and, there's a couple of things happening along with Juneteenth. So I just wanted to give some information about that. On June 14, there is a Juneteenth free park concert as well as just celebration in Anaheim at the Pearson

Commissioner Wenderchuk, I'm so sorry to interrupt you. Now we're still in the Freon Sagerstrom program. I'm So any final comments on that, but we will be moving to commissioner comments next.

Thank you so much.

If you

could just give us

one more minute. So if there's any final comments on the Freon Sagerstrom campus report, this would be your time to offer up those comments. Thank you. Okay, chair? Vice chair. It looks like there's vice chair.

Thank you.

Sorry, I'm just jumping back in here. I'm full of comments and thoughts tonight everyone's coming to, I think, learn. So just going back to the issue that or the matter that we were discussing with regards to size, as I think about it or rather double dipping, excuse me. As I think about it, at this stage, as we've discussed previously, I think having to do with the arts grants, I'm hesitant to put a limit on it just because who knows if we'll actually get five or even 10 applicants this next round. Maybe we will and maybe there'll be more.

So perhaps at this moment I'm for not doing that yet, but again as we start to get more or continue to get more established, we are established. As we continue to get more established and grow our arts grant program, perhaps that might be something we consider kind of in future iterations or future years of this in which we start to put that no double dipping limit or constraint perhaps on organizations. So that was just a quick thought to follow-up on my questions. Owen there.

Thank you, Vice Chair. These are all great points that everyone brought up. I think it's important as we kind of look forward to our next conversation regarding the master plan. And if there are no further comments, it's just a receive and file item. Okay, the final order of business, additional comments. Director Gruner do you have any at this moment?

Thank you Madam Chair I do. I just want to make the commission aware that next week at the PACS commission meeting there will be a presentation on the Brentwood Park playground project. We've done quite a bit of extensive outreach over the last week and a half, two weeks almost now. We issued out a survey to anybody who pretty much uses the park, and we've received over 400 survey results back. We will be analyzing that and presenting that at the PACS meeting.

There will also be a consideration for an arts component in there as well, so we do encourage the commission to perhaps attend the meeting and express any interest regarding an art component that could be included in there. We do have some ideas and funding. There is a grant that we are applying for that will help subsidize that particular project. But we won't find out until July 28 whether we got that grant or not. But there could be some additional funds that could be utilized for an art component into that project as well.

So I just want to make the commission aware of In addition to I heard earlier in regards to the study session with the council, in regards to the ethics and the objectives and the goals of the commissions and the committees, that will be coming forward in July. There will be more to come informationally regarding when that's going to be exactly. But it looks like early July, probably right after July 4, in the following week. So there will be some more information to come to you guys on that as well. That's all I have for now. Thank you.

Thank you, Director Gruner. Now I'll open it up to Commissioner comments. Commissioner Wondrchuk.

Okay. So what I was just sharing is that Juneteenth is a celebration of African American history, and there are several different places where you can celebrate, sing, dance, make crafts, and just have a beautiful time. So June 14 in Anaheim at Pearson Park, twelve noon to six, there will be a free Juneteenth event there. June 19 is the actual day of Juneteenth. Buena Park, in their park called Boseric Park, six p.

M. Till probably ten p. M, we'll be having a Juneteenth event there. And then at Chapman University, there's a concert called Gospel Voices of Orange County. I'm actually involved with that particular event. That's taking place on Sunday, June 22. It's a formal concert of classical music, jazz, gospel music, gospel choirs that it is open to the public as well. It's just in, like I'd mentioned, just in celebration of Juneteenth in African American artistry. So we hope we can all get out for that. And then again, just a reminder about Make Music Day. Do not forget June 21 right here in our Lions Park. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Wenderchuk. Any other commissioners?

Yes, I just wanted to make one comment. When you said Brentwood Park earlier, I mean my head just went to Brentwood in LA. I'm so sorry. I didn't know we had a Brentwood Park. I just looked up. There's a lot of Brentwood parks all over the country. And so now that I know where this little park is, I'm very interested. I hope next time we get together, you have something that we will hear more about that. I was so confused. I apologize. Thank you.

I'll jump in again. Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to say, you know, kind of to urge commissioners and the public, you know, I think it was at the study session, Mayor Pro Tem Chavez sitting in this seat kind of said during his public comment that he understood the the roles of, say, the Planning Commission and the PACS Commission, but he wasn't clear on the roles of the arts commission. And

I

think that's a big kind of gaping hole. Perhaps self inflicted by us, by the way in which we're established, however it is however it came about, I understand. But I just want to challenge us, you know, as we go forward and prepare for discussions around the master plan renewal and what that looks like. And to the commission and to the public, what does it mean to be the city of the arts? Hopefully you've picked up.

I've been harping on this over the last few meetings. And I want us to have a bolder and bigger vision for what that means. And I understand there's various factors that are going into place within these plans and other things. But I do want us to dream big. Want to challenge us to consider in the months going forward until we meet again back in August, if I have that correct chair, that we all kind of consider separately what it would look like to be a bigger, bolder city of the arts. Even talk to our council members because I know my council member has iterated time and time again to me that he really wants that substantial vision from me and from us. So I just ask you all to participate in that with me and come back full of ideas ready to go. Until then, thank you.

Thank you, Vice Chair. I do agree with you. I think we need to stay visible. Pardon me, Commissioner Ford.

Just very briefly, on July 3, the city of Costa Mesa is having its Independence Day celebration. I would encourage everyone to attend. It's from 05:00 to 11:00. The eighties all star band and the Tijuana dogs are going to be performing. They're both wonderful bands. They're very fun. There's food and drink. It's family friendly. There's rib eating contests. There are all kinds of activities for the entire family. And I hope to see you all there. And there's a fantastic fireworks show at the end. So I would invite you all to join. I hope to see you there.

Will you be singing?

I will also be singing the national anthem at 05:05 in case you want to come at 05:06.

I'm looking forward to all these upcoming events, Make Music Day and the July 3 celebration. And I think maybe we'll have a booth set up there at both of these events just to make sure that we're visible and we build relationships with the public and engage directly with the people that we serve. So, I look forward to seeing everyone at some point this summer, if not August. With that, I will now adjourn our meeting. Our time is

07:48.

07:48. Our next regularly scheduled meeting is 08/07/2025 at seven or six p. M.