Wetlands Defense Fund Stages Rally Outside Annenberg Center

Several environmental, conservation and animal welfare groups joined forces outside the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills Thursday night for a rally and march in the form of a “Shadow Gala” at the center's opening night gala.

The much anticipated performing arts center opened its doors on Tuesday. The organizers of the rally stressed they were supportive of the arts center according to Marcia Hanscom, executive director of the Ballona Institute in Playa del Rey.

She said they came to protest philanthropist Wallis Annenberg’s first payment of many that are memorialized in a "secretly negotiated agreement" with three California state agencies to essentially buy her own private agenda on public land that was saved from development in 2003 in order to protect wildlife, including rare and endangered species that inhabit the Ballona Wetlands Ecological Reserve on the Los Angeles coast.

Dozens of activists from various organizations dressed in their evening best, as if they were going to attend the gala, but instead, gathered at the Beverly Gardens Park across the street from the refurbished post office and new arts center and marched from corner to corner to corner at Canon Drive and Santa Monica Boulevard.

The groups had planned on having banners and signs with their messages aimed at Wallis Annenberg closer to the event entrance, as long as they stayed on public property on the sidewalks. However, once the marching began, Hanscom said Beverly Hills police informed organizers that the sidewalks on the south side of Santa Monica Boulevard had been "paid for" by the Annenberg’s organization and protestors would not be allowed so near to where attendees would be entering the building.

Hanscom said that besides Annenberg, actors Robert Redford and Brad Pitt, reportedly the co-chairpersons of the gala, were targeted by the activists with written letters delivered to their representatives seeking their help in convincing The Annenberg Foundation to reconsider their involvement at the Ballona Wetlands.

Both actors are known for their concerns for environmental causes.

“It seems ironic that here we are protesting the state government abandoning normal rules in exchange for The Annenberg Foundation’s financial largesse, and we come face to face with another example where a billionaire can basically 'buy' public space," Hansom said. "Something is seriously wrong with this picture."

The groups re-positioned the protest so that vehicles entering for the gala could clearly see the messages directed at Annenberg.