Judge halts City Light spending for public art

By Bob Young
Seattle Times staff reporter

STEVE RINGMAN / THE SEATTLE TIMES A colored-light art installation reflects in a pool outside McCaw Hall. The city argued that the low-voltage lighting promoted conservation, justifying City Light funding.

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What does a $100,000 artwork hanging at Seattle's new opera house have to do with City Light, which paid for it? Not enough, according to a King County Superior Court judge, who ruled that the municipal utility should no longer pay for art that isn't closely tied to its mission of furnishing electricity.

Judge Sharon Armstrong's decision this week in a complex lawsuit could have a sweeping impact on public art in Seattle. Armstrong said the city's "One Percent for Art" program was invalid for City Light and that the utility had spent more than $1 million in the past four years on "impermissible" art projects.

Her ruling doesn't sit well with some arts advocates. Former Mayor Paul Schell called the judge's decision "absolutely ridiculous," said she must be an "extreme right-winger" and predicted that it will hurt the city's economic and cultural life, if allowed to stand.

Philip Wohlstetter, past president of Allied Arts, agreed that the decision could have enormous impact and said it was a "body blow to the idea of Seattle as arts Mecca."

Armstrong's ruling results from a decision in November by the state Supreme Court.

In that decision, the Supreme Court found the city created an unconstitutional "revenue-raising ploy" when it started charging Seattle City Light ratepayers for streetlights in late 1999. The court said providing public lighting was a government function that should have been paid for by general tax revenues, not tacked on to electric bills.

In their unanimous decision, justices said the remedy in the case should be decided by King County Superior Court.

Utility as 'cash cow'

In their lawsuit, plaintiffs led by former City Light employee Rud Okeson also argued that city officials used City Light as a "cash cow" and charged it for a variety of expenses that were illegitimate, including some art projects.

Armstrong agreed in part, saying much of the $2.8 million City Light spent on art in the past four years was impermissible. She also said the city's One Percent for Art ordinance, which mandates that 1 percent of capital-projects costs go to public art, was invalid for City Light because the money was spent to benefit the general public and not electricity ratepayers.

In explaining her reasoning, Armstrong said City Light could pay for art to "beautify its own offices and customer-service facilities" but could not fund art displayed in other city offices or projects that have the primary purpose of improving City Light's image.

She went on to say City Light could still purchase art, but only if such spending has a "close nexus to the utility's primary purpose of furnishing electricity to ratepayers."

Applying that logic to actual art, she said projects such as a documentary film about City Light's Boundary Dam were permissible. But she concluded that other works, including sculptures on the Ballard Bridge and an installation called "Dreaming in Light" by Leni Schwendinger at the opera house, Marion O. McCaw Hall, lacked a close enough connection to City Light's mission.

City lawyers had argued that those two projects promoted energy conservation, an important element of City Light's mission, because they were illuminated by low-voltage lights, an important innovation in conservation.

But Armstrong didn't buy it, saying the city could not use the conservation rationale "merely because it (a piece of art) mentions salmon, or contains illuminated art work."

Will Patton, the utilities section chief for the Seattle City Attorney's Office, said he believes Armstrong's ruling on City Light's art expenditures would also apply to the city's water and waste-collection utilities, similarly restricting their spending on art.

Doubly painful for Schell

For Schell, the judge's ruling was doubly painful. When he was mayor, Schell had advocated for the streetlight financing deemed unlawful last November. He was also instrumental in creating the "One Percent for Art" program back in 1973 when he was president of Allied Arts.

Schell argued that corporations find it in their best interest to underwrite public art because of its broad community benefits, so why shouldn't City Light follow the same thinking?

In addition, he said the ability of cities such as Seattle to attract jobs is linked to their cultural richness — so, a lack of art can mean a drop in economic vitality.

Schell maintains the judge's interpretation of how ratepayers' dollars should be spent was too narrow.

"It's in the ratepayers' interest to think more broadly than, 'What's my bill tomorrow?' This ruling says a public utility must act only in the most narrow of selfish interests. It can only spend to benefit its customers, but not the citizens who are its shareholders and owners," he said.

He called the judge's decision "appalling" and said the city should appeal. Patton said no decision has been made yet on an appeal.

Wohlstetter, of Allied Arts, joined Schell in urging an appeal. "For someone on the bench to turn into an art critic is comical," he said.

Nick Licata, chairman of the City Council's arts committee, suggested one way that electricity customers could keep funding all kinds of art.

"We could have a check-off on utility bills that would allow for regular, minimal and voluntary contributions. I think there might be support for that idea, and that's something I'd be willing to propose because people recognize that public art improves the quality of life," he said.

Bob Young: 206-464-2174 or byoung@seattletimes.com

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company

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