bronzecow Although it’s been less than two years since the Bellflower City Council voted to spend $95,000 on a slightly larger-than-life bronze sculpture of a dairy cow, now that the big ol’ bovine—nicknamed “Belle”—is about to come out of the foundry, nobody seems to remember where they intended to put her.

City Manager Mike Egan has been doing his best to come up with something. He’s proposed locations, on property public and private, including Kaiser Permanente clinic at Rosecrans Avenue and Clark Street,  several parks, the Carpenter House Museum at Caruthers Park, and several major intersections.

Additionally the council has directed city staff to ask the Metropolitan Transportation Authority—owners of the Bellflower West Branch Greenway pedestrian and bike path through the city—if it would accept the sculpture on its right of way.

Then there’s always the  restored Pacific Electric Depot/Apple Orchard, located on Bellflower Blvd. right next to the trail. That spot is already home to the city’s first art project—a sculpture of a boy on a cart titled “Journey to Market.” Last year the Bellflower Council also permitted a faith-based not-for-profit agency to erect 10 craggy pillars on the publicly owned adjacent lawn, a sculpture intended to”honor” the Ten Commandments. 

Wherever the bronze cow ends up is going to be expensive. The $95,000 allocated for her creation by sculptor Carol Gold does not include the cost of installation—estimated between $10,000 and $20,000—as well as the cost of maintaining the sculpture.

Funding will come from the city’s Public Arts account, established in 2005 and funded by a one-percent levy on developers or builders on the cost of their projects.

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