ART BOARD LOOKS FOR NEW HOME; MUSEUM HAS RAISED $60,000.

Byline: Cecilia Chan Staff Writer

For the past five years, the Conejo Valley Art Museum, which sponsors the popular Artwalk each year, has operated out of Maria Dessornes' house.

Board members are eyeing a soon-to-be renovated portion of the former City Hall complex at 401 Hillcrest Drive as the next home for the 23-year-old art museum, which previously occupied donated space at the Janss Marketplace.

Dessornes said the museum has raised $60,000 toward buying a building. And last Tuesday she asked the City Council about the possibility of leasing the remaining building on Hillcrest with an option to buy it.

``We have (looked at other buildings) but they have been only for lease and not for sale,'' said Dessornes, president of the museum board of directors.

``We are going to consider it and look at the proposal,'' said James Friedl Jr., deputy city manager.

A Santa Barbara collector has offered $5.5 million in art when a permanent museum site is found.

However, the city's only art museum may find tough competition ahead because private corporations and government entities also have expressed interest in the building.

Friedl said the art museum has proposed paying $1,000 a month in rent - well below the market rate of about $72,000 a month.

``We are talking to people willing to lease or discuss things closer to market (price),'' Friedl said.

The National Park Service is leasing the smaller of the two buildings on site at $411,840 a year for five years with an additional three-year option.

The city vacated 401 Hillcrest Drive in 1988 because of asbestos contamination and moved its operations to the Civic Arts Plaza, where it remains today.

The Hillcrest complex, dedicated in 1973, was the city's first City Hall and was designated as a landmark in 1997.

At one time, city officials considered selling the site to help pay for the new municipal building on Thousand Oaks Boulevard, but a weak economy killed the idea.

Instead, the buildings were gutted in the asbestos removal, and the 18,000-square-foot building was refurbished for about $3.5 million and leased to the National Park Service, which moved in last year.

The shell of the larger building, 36,000 square feet, and surrounding property are now being improved in anticipation of a tenant, said Edward Johnduff, city special projects manager. He said the tenant will need to make most of the interior improvements.

In the current city budget, the council allocated $4 million to rehabilitate the building and $300,000 for the site improvements, and an architect has been retained.

``They are in the process of a building evaluation to determine what has to be done,'' Johnduff said.

Requests for bids on site improvements - such as landscaping, a sprinkler system and lighting - will go out in January, he said.

Requests for bids on the major project will be sought in April, he predicted, and the building will be ready for leasing next year.

A lawsuit is still pending over work on the first building, City Attorney Mark Sellers said.

Alpha Construction of Van Nuys sued the city in 1997 after it was fired for delays on rehabilitating the south building. The city released Alpha from the contract and stopped payment after only 80 percent of the work was completed by the deadline date.

Company officials claimed the delay was caused by the city's failure to secure some of the necessary permits from utility companies for the contractors to finish the electrical work and by El Nino storms.

Sellers said a trial is likely in mid-2000.

``We are proceeding along with the belief this litigation will have to go to trial,'' he said.