Palm Springs Walk of Stars could be getting new management

The Palm Springs Walk of Stars has recognized people for 26 years. For 16 of those 26 years, Bob Alexander’s life has been the Palm Springs Walk of Stars.

“When we first started, the foundation had taken a big loss. and my wife and I had loaned the foundation $10,000. They paid us back and I worked for free for the first four years,” Alexander said.

Since 2002, Alexander has seen about 180 stars installed on the streets of Palm Springs.

But in about two weeks, that could be changing. The license agreement between Alexander’s organization and the city is up on June 4 and questions are being asked about the future of the program.

“Rumors are rampant all over the valley that they’re awarding the new contract to the chamber. They’ve not talked to us about it,” Alexander said.

When asked how that makes him feel, Alexander said, “Sad and they’ve never so much as said thank you for your service.”

Alexander says city leaders have told him there have been too many stars on the organization. City councilmembers even suggesting a moratorium for new star applications at a meeting last year.

“There are some concerns from people that it’s gotten to be a “Pay to Play” thing,” said Palm Springs Mayor Robert Moon.

“That was probably the worst thing that has ever been said about the Palm Springs Walk of Stars and it could not be further from the truth,” Alexander said in response.

Since then, the I-Team has been asking city leaders about the attraction, Moon, and councilmember J.R. Roberts told KESQ & CBS Local 2 in November they were expecting to present ideas at a city council meeting in December. Both Alexander and others say that hasn’t happened yet.

When asked why this has not been brought up in a public city council meeting, Roberts said, “Well the city, as I said earlier to you, the city has hundreds of license agreements and they take time to negotiate.”

“I don’t know if you noticed, but it takes us a long time for us to do anything at city hall. We drag things out forever. It’s just there’s so much stuff going on,” Moon said.

When asked, city leaders told KESQ & CBS Local 2 in a statement they had several meetings with the director of the organization on this issue and that on the June 6 meeting they will be recommending an agreement with the city’s chamber of commerce with proceeds going back to the city.

“The remainder of the money that comes from the stars, which currently is in the bank accounts of the licensee of the Palm Springs Walk of Stars, would be used to go to an account in the city that would be used for public events downtown,” Moon said.

We realized the original walk of stars in Hollywood is run by its chamber of commerce and as this program was growing, and getting more popular, and getting more noticed. We thought perhaps it’d be good to have our chamber give it a try,” Roberts said.

Roberts also mentioned a concern with money from stars in Alexander’s organization and where it will go once the contract is up.

“They’ve amassed $100,000-$150,000, and essentially profit from the stars. and we don’t know how that money is being spent, and they haven’t really told us what they’re going to do with that.

But Alexander hopes his organization can carry the torch further.

“We’ve never had one single complaint. never in the 16 years that we’ve guided the walk of stars. I think that, that alone deserves our contract being renewed,” Alexander said.

City leaders are hoping to come to a solution soon.

“The city wanted him to carry on the program but he was very unwilling to work with the city, in terms of the things mentioned earlier, like having the proceeds actually go back towards city events and community events,” Roberts said.

“Palm Springs is booming. so, let’s take this walk of stars and move it into the 21st century,” Moon said.

We reached out to the Palm Springs Chamber of Commerce who has no comment at this time.

If the city doesn’t renew with Alexander, he might start an online, nationwide walk of stars or a walk of stars in one of two cities he’s considering, either in the valley or in orange county.