Gina Lopez, the new top executive at Escondido’s arts center, seeks to build connections, whether it’s with the local community, city officials or other nonprofits in town.
”I’ve always found that the key to success is partnerships,” said Lopez, who took on her role as CEO of the California Center for the Arts, Escondido, in January. “When you build an audience, you build an audience for everyone. It’s important that we cultivate that together. You can never have too much of the arts.”
Escondido’s flagship arts center was built in 1994 and is owned by the city. A nonprofit foundation now directed by Lopez runs the center under a contract with the city. In March, the arts center board and the Escondido City Council approved a new management contract for operation of the center, which includes a 1,500-seat concert hall, a 400-seat theater, a museum, art and dance studios and a conference center. The center is located on N. Escondido Boulevard next to City Hall and Grape Day Park.
Among her first initiatives, said Lopez, 51, who came to Escondido after heading a community-based arts center in Carson City, Nevada, is a community survey to determine what people want to see among CCAE’s offerings.
“This is the first step to see what we can do better and build on what we are doing right,” Lopez said. “I want to reach everybody, old, young, all ethnic backgrounds, so we are programming what our community wants to see. We want to make sure we are representing all of our community though the arts.”
As an example of what the center’s expanded offerings could look like, this year a Juneteenth celebration is being added to the center’s calendar of events for the first time. That event will such annual celebrations as Fourth of July, Dia de los Muertos and Winter Wonderland.
Next year, Lopez said, she wants to stage a pride event to celebrate the community’s LGBTQ population.
The center is also continuing to build on its original theatrical programming. Last year, the center staged a premiere musical called “Witnesses,” which took home a number of awards from the San Diego Theater Critics Circle. This year, the center’s in-house theatrical department is staging another premiere, a musical based on the film “Bottle Shock,” about the early days of California wine-making, when Napa Valley wines competed in a blind taste test with their Parisian counterparts.
Lopez has built her career around the arts, working as an artist, educator, event manager and, from 2014 until her arrival in Escondido, as executive director of Brewery Arts Center in Carson City. The Brewery Arts Center is an independent, multidisciplinary nonprofit arts organization in two historic buildings on two city blocks in downtown Carson City.
When she came to the Brewery Center, said Lopez, it was facing foreclosure and bankruptcy. But she had grown up in Carson City when the organization had been a vibrant community arts center and, “I thought it was worth saving,” she said.
She and other ers launched a popular concert series that proved to be the linchpin of turning the financially ailing arts center around. Here in Escondido, she said, she sees the opportunity to build artistic bridges on an even larger scale.
She was also drawn by the appeal of the Southern California lifestyle and the availability of a larger array of services for her disabled son, Lopez said.
Among her tasks going forward, said Lopez, is getting the word out about the arts center’s contributions, both as a venue for creation and enjoyment of the arts, but also as an economic driver for the city.
“We need to tell that story,” said Lopez. She noted that, according to the advocacy group Americans for the Arts, the average arts event attendee spends $31.47 on ancillary services, such as food, parking or shopping. With 85,000 tickets sold for arts center events last year, that amounts to $2.6 million in additional spending in Escondido.
As she embraces her new role as arts center CEO, Lopez is cognizant of past controversies, such as an art installation last year that caught city leaders off guard and offended some in the community. The work included a large photograph of police officers in riot gear, and in the foreground were three cartoon-like pigs in police uniforms, dancing on a pile of donuts.
The installation was part of a larger exhibit of street art including graffiti, skateboarding and lowrider culture.
“We want to be good stewards,” Lopez said. “We want to have good lines of communication (with city officials) to avoid controversy like last summer. We don’t want to offend anybody, that’s not the goal. The goal is to bring people together.”
At a March 22 meeting, on a 5-0 vote, the City Council approved a new management agreement with the nonprofit arts center foundation to run the center through June 2024, with an option to renew the contract for an additional year. The city will pay a management fee of $660,000 per year, plus insurance s of about $100,000, according to a city staff report.
The city also pays for utilities, maintenance and IT for the arts center, with the total outlay this fiscal year budgeted at $2.3 million. The arts center’s annual budget this year is $8.8 million, with the bulk of the money raised through ticket sales, facility rentals, grants and private donations, said Lopez. Historically, the city has subsidized the center between $2 million and $2.5 million.
In spite of the council’s unanimous vote for the agreement, Councilmember Mike Morasco said he believes the city’s financial for the center should be reduced, with the foundation raising more money to cover its expenses.
He particularly objected to the city’s payment of the center’s utility bills — this year estimated at $810,000 — and IT of about $100,000.
“We need to figure out a way to contain this,” said Morasco. “It’s something I feel desperately needs to be addressed.”
One option for saving money on utility costs, said Lopez, would be converting the center to LED lighting, which would require an investment from the city.
“We do want to be good partners and run everything as economically as possible,” she said.
