UPDATE:Stage Combat
The Forest Theater Guild mounts a campaign to contest PacRep's lease of the Indoor Forest Theatre.
By Walter Ryce , MONTEREY COUNTY WEEKLY, January 06, 2011 11:19 AM
ABSTRACT: During Appearances at the Tuesday, January 4, 2011 City Council Meeting, resident Adam Moniz and Rebecca Barrymore, President of the Forest Theatre Guild, spoke to the City Council 2 November 2010 agenda item, namely “Receive report and provide policy direction on circulating a Request for Proposal (RFP) for the management and operation of the Children’s Experimental Theater” and the City Council’s subsequent unanimous decision to “negotiate a lease with Pac Rep for the Children’s Experimental Theater with a revised rental fee structure.” Both their remarks are transcribed with a link to the video. City Attorney Don Freeman was absent during Appearances. At the end of Appearances, Mayor Sue McCloud stated that "until he [Don Freeman] gets here the questions that were submitted by Adam are addressed to the City Attorney, so, I think he needs to respond to them and we need to get the documents." City Administrator Rich Guillen was silent on the matter. Later in the meeting, City Attorney Don Freeman commented about questions by Adam Moniz on a prior application and stated "We're not going to run into this problem again" (Source: Archived Video, 2:00:05 - 2:00:15), thereby recognizing the City violated the Brown Act at the 2 November 2010 City Council meeting.
Regular Meeting
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
City Hall
East side of Monte Verde Street between Ocean and Seventh Avenues
Archived video streaming
VI. Public Appearances
Anyone wishing to address the City Council on matters within the jurisdiction of the City and are not on the agenda may do so now. Matters not appearing on the City Council’s agenda will not receive action at this meeting but may be referred to staff for a future meeting. Presentations will be limited to three (3) minutes, or as otherwise established by the City Council. Persons are not required to give their names, but it is helpful for speakers to state their names in order that the City Clerk may identify them in the minutes of the meeting. Always speak into the microphone, as the meeting is recorded. The City Council Chambers is equipped with a portable microphone for anyone unable to come to the podium. Assisted listening devices are available upon request of the City Clerk. If you need assistance, please advise Heidi Burch as to which item you would like to comment on and the microphone will be brought to you.
Adam Moniz: Good afternoon, Mayor McCloud and members of the Council. I am Adam Moniz, a resident of Carmel-by-the-Sea...In a recent City Council meeting, the City Council voted in favor of a motion made by Councilwoman Hazdovac to “negotiate a lease with Pac Rep for the Children’s Experimental Theatre with a revised rental fee structure.”
But many members of our community have noticed that there was nothing on the Brown Act posted agenda for that meeting involving any proposed lease with Pac Rep for C.E.T.
What the posted agenda for that meeting said was that the City Council was going to “receive a report and provide policy direction on,” and this is the most important part, “circulating a Request for Proposal (RFP)” for the management and operation of the Children’s Experimental Theatre.”
So that leads me to the following question: So that our community has a better understanding of the law and its application, could you please explain how the City Council was acting in compliance with the Brown Act when it noticed one thing on its posted agenda, yet did a completely different thing at the actual meeting. In case it’s helpful, I would remind everyone that neither the City Administrator’s report nor the agenda packet presented to the City Council in connection with that meeting was an acceptable substitute for the posted agenda mandated by the Brown Act.
As all of you knew prior to taking that vote, since the City Administrator did tell you, many in our community were diligently working on proposals to continue C.E.T.’s legacy, it wasn’t just Pac Rep. But the real world or end result of your actions at that meeting was that all others in our community were effectively prevented from presenting their proposals for your consideration --- and they weren’t even given notice that was about to happen.
In short, you all voted to do something entirely different from what you placed on your legally mandated posted agenda, and that’s problematic not only from the standpoint of current California law, but also from a standpoint of basic fairness.
So why not start the New Year off right by correcting this perceived wrong. Allowing all those interested to present their well-crafted proposals would be good for our community, as opposed to considering and prejudging the merits of only a single proposal, to the exclusion of all others.
I hope you seize this opportunity. Thank you all very much.
(Source: Archived Video, 50:55 - 54:15)
Rebecca Barrymore, President of Forest Theatre Guild: Good afternoon, Happy New Year to you all.
Dear Madam Mayor and City Council of Carmel, I have been asked to speak to you today on behalf of the Forest Theatre Guild, as the President of the Board of Directors and the Artistic Director. Our new Board of Directors has asked me to voice their concerns as to the decision made on the November 2 City Council meeting, that Adam just referred to, granting a lease to Pacific Repertory for the Indoor Forest Theatre space which has been occupied by the Children’s Experimental Theatre the past 50 years. The Board of Directors incoming is consulting with legal counsel currently to validate the legal aspects of this lease and we kindly ask you that you vacate your decision and place the matter on the February agenda to allow the Forest Theatre Guild or any other local theatre group to submit a RFP for use of this space. As our Board includes members from all walks of theatre, we’re very excited to share our proposal for the Children’s Theatre Academy of Arts and our vision for our two talented teachers who are recognized and currently teaching theatre acts in our Carmel schools. They have the highest of recommendations from their principals and their drams teachers there. We welcome the opportunity to present this proposal that was hand delivered to your city offices on November 15 at your February Council meeting and we look forward to sharing our upcoming season of productions and events to you as well.
The Board of the Forest Theatre Guild thanks you for your commitment to community arts and our local youth programs in Carmel. Thank you.
(Source: Archived Video, 54:20 - 56:20)
8 comments:
Greetings,
After reading Adam and Rebecca's comments, and reviewing the video you provided here, I am concerned that Adam may have been misled by the Forest Theater Guild (FTG). He stated that "they weren’t even given notice". As I have in my possession a copy of the October email and attachment sent to Safwat Malek, the designated FTG/city representative, where notice was indeed given to the FTG, it puts the lie to both Adam and the FTG. To clarify, I believe Adam was misled and used by the FTG, as I would find it hard to believe that he would willfully mislead the council and the community. I invite Adam, and any member of the community, to review the notification that was sent to the FTG. They were informed about the meeting, AND the various options being presented to council, and they chose not to attend, preferring to create an issue after the fact, and misleading Adam, the council and community in the process. I would also hope that Adam does the right thing and corrects his erroneous comments.
Regretfully,
Stephen Moorer
Founder and Executive Director
Pacific Repertory Theatre
I love both the performaces of Pac Rep as well as the FTG. Carmel is so fortunate to have these two theater groups in town!
In reading the above comments of Steven Moorer of Pac Rep, however, it striked me that he may be tying to confuse people. Based on what I read and what I saw in the video, this has nothing to do with whether FTG was provided with notice of anything. What this has to do with is whether or not the 5 members of the Carmel City Council complied with the law (here, the Brown Act) when looking at what they put on their posted agenda for that meeting compared to what they actually did at the meeting.
So don't look at this as a Pac Rep vs. FTG thing, both are GREAT organizations and they should be friends with each other. What this controversy is really all about is whether the Carmel City Council followed the law. And based on the City Attorney's comments towards the end of the meeting, when he mentioned Adam Moniz's statement/question, it sure sounds like Adam Moniz is correct.
ps- I never once heard Adam reference the Forest Theater Guild in his comments. He seemed more concerned with making sure everyone in Carmel who had a proposal had the opportunity to be heard.
Julie Evers
Thanks for your comments Julie. Allow me to clarify my position so you are not confused: I was not addressing the Brown Act issues. I am not an attorney and would not presume. I was only addressing Adam's statement that notice was not given to those "many" other community members preparing proposals, (ie: the Forest Theater Guild). The Guild was informed fully about the options on the table. Unfortunately, they have told others in the community and the press (Coast Weekly) that they did not receive any notice, which of course is an out and out lie. Adam and the FTG's Rebecca showed up together and had coordinated statements. Adam also misspoke when he said that the council was told of "many" competing proposals in the works, when in actuality, they was only the one potential proposal (from the FTG) that they were aware of. After receiving notice from the city, the Guild failed to even show up at the meeting - and their absence was clearly noted.
In terms of Brown Act issues, I am content to wait and see how the city responds before I make any assumptions. And to clarify further, I am not saying that Adam willfully misled council with some of his non-Brown Act comments. I firmly believe he was misled and would encourage him to do his fact checking. Trust, but verify!
SM
The longest serving council member, Paula Hazdovac, sixteen years going on twenty years, made the motion outside the scope of the agenda item description and clearly a violated the Brown Act.
In over two months, the city did not correct its own error by placing this item on the December 2010 agenda or January 2011 agenda. The city and council waited for members of the public to call them on it.
The city attorney was present at the November meeting and should have stopped the council from voting to grant PacRep a lease when it was not on the agenda. Something Don Freeman seemed to get by the end of the January 2011 meeting.
It appears the city council is so distracted by the physical presence but mental absence of Rich Guillen that they cannot do the most basic and elementary things right, such as properly following the Brown Act.
From the city administrator to the mayor and council members to the city attorney, they all failed in their respective duties to, at a minimum, follow the law. Carmelites cannot afford anymore governance failures.
The FTG President said "The Board of Directors incoming is consulting with legal counsel currently to validate the legal aspects of this lease and we kindly ask you that you vacate your decision and place the matter on the February agenda to allow the Forest Theatre Guild or any other local theatre group to submit a RFP for use of this space."
FTG submitted their own proposal in November 2010 and at the meeting went out of their way to encourage the council to solicit RFPs from other local theater groups. The city not soliciting RFPs for the Indoor Forest Theater/CET and going ahead with negotiating a lease with PacRep reminds me of the way the mayor drove the city's actions when the city did not solicit RFPs for the management of Sunset Center. With Sunset Center, SCC was the only organization considered and installed without much vetting or robust debate of all the alternatives.
The City under Sue McCloud has developed a bad habit of blindly going ahead with personal preferences or expediency and in some cases blatantly violating laws without reforming their ways.
Even if the city council rescinds its previous action and enters into a RFP process, the wrong actions taken previously have compromised the process. If PacRep ends up with the blessing of the council and gets the lease, then other groups will never know if their proposals got a fair shake. If FTG is awarded the lease, PacRep will probably feel slighted. All parties and the public deserve better from our city government representatives.
This fellow Moorer seems very mean-spirited and alittle too anxious to have his 'illegally obtained' lease honored by a faulty city administration. Also, maybe more importantly: (according to the library files on record) this indoor theater was built by the FTG and it was Cole Weston who granted CET use of it in the first place. Shouldn't the FTG get some consideration?
And, doesn't this fellow Moorer already own and operate The Golden Bough and Circle Theatre along with a SODA program? Wouldn't this create a monopoly of children's theater arts in this small community?
Well..., it's a bit hard to respond to a personal attack when it comes from"anonymous", as it's impossible to determine if there is a private agenda involved. Hiding behind a pseudonym does lead one to wonder, though. Regardless, I will respond one last time and then withdraw from this conversation and its growing silliness.
---First, it's not mean-spirited to call a spade a spade. When a person or organization misrepresents the facts, repeatedly, there comes a time to set the record straight. It's never enjoyable, but sometimes one has no choice. I'm afraid that time has come again. (FYI - this is not the first time that statements originating from the FTG have had to be corrected on this blog and in the press.)
---Also - it was the City that granted use of the indoor Forest to CET. Cole was an employee of the city at the time. In fact, he was the city's first cultural director and it was in that role that he acted as "landlord". His affiliation with the original FTG had nothing to do with the leasing decisions. (And why would it - it's a city-owned facility - it doesn't belong to the FTG).
---Next -The FTG of 1949 dissolved in the early 1960's. The current FTG is a completely different organization, founded in 1972 (according to Guidestar.com).
---Finally, I do not "own" the Golden Bough, the Circle, or SoDA (School of Dramatic Arts). Pacific Repertory Theatre is a California non-profit organization which is (essentially) owned by the people of California, with oversight by a local Board of Directors. Accusations of a "monopoly" are truly odd. Has "anonymous" not heard of the Carmel Academy of Performing Arts? Or the Actor's Forum children's theater program? And that's just in Carmel!
---But what's most important in this... debate... is that Marcia Hovick and the CET Board of Directors chose PacRep to continue their legacy. That point seems to have been ignored in this discussion. As a result, the SoDA program has moved to the Indoor Forest Theatre to provide the SoDA kids a home and to continue the invaluable work of Marcia and CET. The remaining CET students have been given free placement in the SoDA program and the SoDA program has been expanded to reflect the subjects that CET used to cover.
---Obviously, "anonymous" needs to do better fact checking, and not rely on the rumor mill or the FTG leadership when gathering information. Now, if you consider that statement as "mean-spirited", then we'll just have to agree to disagree.
Respectfully,
SM
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