Citizen Rally Doesn’t Change Council Stance on New City Hall

• Charges of Broken Campaign Promises Are Dismissed as Majority Upholds Theater Redesign

BY BILL KOENEKER

Dressed in T-shirts emblazoned with “Save Our Seats” and carrying placards protesting the planned loss of theater seats in the new City Hall, a contingent of arts and music folks came to Malibu City Council chambers Monday night to urge members to change their minds on scaling back the former theater of the Malibu Performing Arts Center.

However, Councilmember Laura Rosenthal, who had said she would reconsider the previous council’s approval for final design plans, restated her position on why she was confirming the previous council’s decisions on final plans, including urging a scale back of the theater because a community theater was best for Malibu.

“I don’t want to keep spending $1 million in rent on this [current City Hall] building. It doesn’t have an adequate conference room. The new city hall will have so many more things. We are not destroying the theater. We are changing the theater into a great community theater for use of the residents of Malibu, which is my number one goal. It is not a cultural center. We do need a cultural center. That place was never it,” she said.

Protestors like Guardia Fox, who has spearheaded the criticism of the theater cutback, insisted to council members the theater would not be better because it was smaller. She said the city could save money by leaving the theater untouched.

Kim Cunningham and her ten-year-old daughter Macy came to tell council members how much they had utilized the Malibu Performing Arts Center in the past.

Others insisted the lack of success of the MPAC was due to poor marketing and a failed public relations campaign.

Councilmember Pamela Conley Ulich, who holds the sole minority position on the council not supporting reducing the size of the theater, said she too was wearing an SOS T-shirt and argued there were just too many seats being taken out.

The previous council, over the objections of Conley Ulich, had approved the final design plans for the new City Hall which had even become a campaign issue during the city council race.

Conley Ulich has kept the issue alive, helping organize protestors and has faced off with her colleagues over the issue on several different occasions.