WeHo Will Consider Naming a Poet Laureate

West Hollywood may be home to only two real bookstores, and its annual book fair may be on ice, but it isn’t ready to abandon the written word.

The City Council on Monday will consider a proposal to create the honorary position of poet laureate. The poet laureate would “act as a champion for poetry, language and the arts and would create a unique artistic legacy through public readings and civic interactions,” says a proposal that will go before the Council.

“The purpose of a civic poet laureate program would be to raise the status of poetry and literature in the everyday consciousness of residents and visitors,” says the proposal, which was prepared by the city’s Economic Development Division. That division houses the city’s cultural affairs operation, headed by Andrew Campbell.

California created a poet laureate position under Gov. Hiram Warren Johnson. In 1915, Ina Donna Coolbrith was named to the position. Gov. Jerry Brown named Juan Felipe Herrera, a poet and professor at the University of California Riverside to the postion in 2012. That same year, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa named Eloise Klein Healy as that city’s first poet laureate. Healy, who has written seven books of poetry, is paid $10,000 a year in that position.

Under the proposal, candidates for West Hollywood poet laureate must show:

• Deep connections to the cultural life of West Hollywood;

• Work of literary excellence;

• Evidence of having had impact on other writers and on the literature of West Hollywood;

• An ability and willingness to conduct the public engagement duties of the office; and

• Have a strong city, state, national or international reputation.

The West Hollywood poet laureate would be named to a two-year term with an annual stipend of $1,500. He or she would lead a poetry writing workshop in West Hollywood and organize a poetry reading or other literary event in the city. The poet laureate also would write and publish an original poem celebrating West Hollywood and read a poem in the annual installation of the city’s mayor.

If the proposal is approved, a committee composed of members of the West Hollywood Library programming committee along with one or more members of the local literary community would select a poet laureate for approval by the City Council.

The Council will take up the proposal at its meeting in the Council Chamber at 625 N. San Vicente Blvd. south of Santa Monica. The meeting begins at 6:30 p.m.