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MONDAY, APRIL 19, 2010
Volume 9 Issue 136
Santa Monica Daily Press GREAT LAKES PEST SEE PAGE 6
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THE VISIT SMDP.COM ISSUE
Concert costs went up as sponsorships vanished BY NICK TABOREK Daily Press Staff Writer
SM PIER Facing an 80 percent decline in corpo-
CALLING FOR CLEAN AIR
Brandon Wise brandonw@smdp.com Members of the North Westdale Neighborhood Association and the Mar Vista Community Council gather to protest air pollution at Santa Monica Airport on Sunday. The airport has been at the center of an ongoing fight over pollution created by aircraft.
The inexpensive skies within reach BY LISA ANDERSON Special to the Daily Press
SMO With the economy as it is, many warned Charles Thomson about beginning a flight training company. His perspective, despite the odds, is that this is the most appropriate time to start his company which is focused on making flying more accessible to the public. “I was learning at one of the other schools on the field and I just realized that it was too expensive. Every time I was wanting to be
Brandon Wise brandonw@smdp.com
rate sponsorships, Pier Restoration Corp. officials announced in March the Twilight Dance Series was in jeopardy and rallied City Hall officials and Santa Monica residents to pitch in to save the annual free summer concerts. What they didn’t mention was the other side of the ledger. While the decline in revenue was real, records of the concert series’ budget between 2004 and 2009 provided by the PRC show the deficit may have had as much to do with sharply increased spending on the concerts as it did with fewer sponsorship deals. Holding the event cost an average of $202,000 for the years 2004 through 2007, but by last year the series’ budget had ballooned to $359,000, a 78 percent spike, the records show. The higher price tag was mostly the result of increased spending on talent, which in turn brought in bigger crowds that required more spending on police supervision, private security and sound and lighting equipment, pier officials said. Ben Franz-Knight, the PRC’s executive director, said the higher spending on the concerts was driven by a big fundraising year in 2008, when pier officials brought in $140,500 in sponsorship money, nearly triple the average figure for the previous four years. That bounty led to an increased investment in the quality of the shows, he said. The PRC spent $175,005 on “talent and producer”costs alone in 2008, a 54 percent increase from the $114,000 it spent the year before. In 2009, though, fundraising from sponsorship deals took a nose dive along with the rest of the economy, and the pier brought in just $29,218 in corporate underwriting. Officials balked at reigning in spending on the concerts, in part because 2009 marked the
TAKING FLIGHT: Flight instructor Charles Thomson stands next to his Sportcruiser at Santa
SEE FLYERS PAGE 7
Monica Airport on Friday morning. He operates Santa Monica Flyers there.
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