What about the Amador Theater?

In 2005, the City Council of Pleasanton started planning for a new community arts center.

The Firehouse Arts Center, housing an intimate 220-seat theater, would be an additional venue to the city along with the Amador, an 800-seat theater.

Susan Andrade –Wax, said, "The intent was to operate both of them together, that they would be complimentary."

That was before the recession.

Now, performances at the Amador, both commercial and non-profit will be temporarily halted. The school district will still have use, and occasional performances will be staged there such as The Princess and the Pea, which are too large for the Firehouse Theater.

"It was a financial decision, a tough financial decision," Andrade-Wax said. "Performing arts centers are always heavily subsidized. You'll never bring in enough money to fully fund them. It's always subsidized by general funds from the county or city or foundations and grants or a combination."

The Firehouse Arts Center will cost $500,000 to a million to run, according to Andrade-Wax. Even with revenue paying back 50 percent, the city no longer has the funds to run both sites.   

In previous years, the Amador Theater had 150 days of programming. A third of those days were used by the school district, another third were used by non-profit or commercial groups and the remainder of the days were taken by 6 to 12 ticket based events.

But city officials say, revenue from tickets sales don't bring in enough funds to keep the Amador open.

At first the city thought they could just bring everything over to the Firehouse but they soon realized that both theaters served different needs.

Andrade-Wax said, "Local groups fill the Amador, or at least 300 to 400 seats." The

Firehouse Theater is an intimate space of 220 seats and can't support large productions previously offered at the Amador. 

The decision to focus on the Firehouse Arts Center was based on the variety of features it would offer. In addition to theater performances, visitors will still be able to enjoy the art galleries, take a class, or listen to a concert in the lobby. The Amador theater is solely for performances and would be closed otherwise.

Andrade-Wax said opening the Amador occassionally isn't as easy as "flicking on a switch." Opening the theater and having a custodian out for one day, then closing for six weeeks, actually costs more than an ongoing service level.

The city is working hard to be creative and come up with ways of funding both theaters. Andrade –Wax said there may be some options. This includes:

• Increase fees for commercial users
• Ask for more from the general fund, which means impacting another department.
• Borrow from the reserve funds

Jamie Renton a Pleasanton resident has come up with a fourth option, and started a fundraising effort with a blog and accompanying Facebook Page for people to donate to the Amador Theater to help with the costs.

For more on the reaction of frustrated residents see our story in June.