Cultural center safe, thanks to samurai

By Bob Krauss
Advertiser Columnist

Fujio "Fudge" Matsuda has finally come clean about how he and some others saved the Japanese Cultural Center by raising $9 million in three months when everybody said it couldn't be done. It's one reason he has been named a Living Treasure.

As you may know, the board of the Japanese Cultural Center was getting deeper and deeper into debt. They were borrowing to pay off the mortgage. The board was ready to vote to sell the building.

Then a small group stepped in and saved the day: Yoshiharu Sato, Colbert Matsumoto, Margaret Oda, Al Miyasato, Lionel Tokioka, Matsuda and "many others." Settle back and read how they did it.

Matsuda said he was on the board when the cultural center was built. "We had to borrow from the bank to put up the building," he said. "The plan was to generate enough revenue from the banquet room to make the payments."

It was a viable plan until hard times hit in the '90s. Within a few years, the debt had ballooned from $6 million to $9 million. By that time

Matsuda was off the board. Something had to be done. The new board found a buyer. They were ready to sell when Matsuda and the rest of the samurai stepped in three months before the loan had to be paid.

By that time people were angry about management of the center. Going for broke was risky. If they rejected the offer to buy, the next one would be far less. Nobody thought they could raise $9 million in three months.

Matsuda said the first thing they did was talk to the buyer, a church group, and ask for a little more time. "They were very good about it," he said. "Without their cooperation, we could never have done it." The next decision was to tell everybody that no check would be cashed until enough money came in to pay the debt.

Everybody in the group contributed $200 to pay for the fund-raising campaign's stationery, stamps, etc. A firm chipped in to help. They elected Matsuda spokesman when they went public, everybody chaired a committee and they went to work.

He said he was amazed when checks came in before the committee asked. "It turned out that a lot of people wanted the center but they didn't know it was being sold," he said. Matsuda said he knew they could raise the money when a child in kindergarten sent 50 cents.

By the time it was over, 10,000 people had donated money to save the center. The checks numbered 4,000. Major donors included the Weinberg Foundation. The banks forgave a large amount of accrued interest that was owed.

The plan is to bring in younger people to run the center because they are the future. Attorney Colbert

Matsumoto will be chairman. That's quite a story, isn't it?

Reach Bob Krauss at 525-8073 or at rkrauss@honoluluadvertiser.com.