Arts groups face bricks-and-mortar dilemma

Sep. 4--David Wohl was wrestling with the bricks-and-mortar dilemma as he sat in a basement conference room Thursday at the West Virginia Cultural Center.

Wohl, co-founder and artistic director of Charleston Stage Company, was sifting through $1.8 million in capital grants applications for the West Virginia Commission for the Arts, on whose board he sits.

The Metropolitan Theater Foundation in Morgantown wanted another $300,000 for its ongoing redo of a 935-seat historic theater in Morgantown. The project received $400,000 in capital grants in prior years.

It was a neat project for a city expected to be the state's largest in 15 years, Wohl said.

But he had doubts about this ambitious project, and he wasn't alone in the room. They all knew that "Build it, and they will come," a saying made famous in the Kevin Costner baseball film "Field of Dreams," did not necessarily come to pass and that new buildings can be so expensive to run that they throw into crisis previously thriving arts groups.

The Metropolitan's $1 million endowment goal wasn't going to be nearly enough once the theater got up and running, said Fred Lambert, who before retirement was CEO at Wheeling-based Oglebay Institute.

When Lambert needed to raise $7 million for Oglebay's capital needs, his board insisted he raise another $7 million in endowment, he recalled. The requirement seemed onerous, but the board was wise to impose it, Lambert said.

The Metropolitan Theater people attached to their application a sheaf of letters of support, including those from local state senators and delegates. Wohl said he was saving lawmakers' letters. If they truly want to support arts groups, Wohl will remind them to fund day-to-day operations after the new building opens.

"They really like us to spend money on bricks and mortar projects," said Susan Landis, the Arts Commission's chairwoman. "It's visible, it's permanent, it's something the community can see."

The Hurricane-based Museum in the Community is visible, but hasn't been busy lately. Since the museum moved from a rented storefront into a new $1.8 million facility eight years ago, the people in charge have failed to whittle down its mortgage and lately struggled to pay bills.

The museum's board just parted company with its executive director and announced plans to become a children's museum with reduced emphasis on visual arts.

The Clay Center has finally paid off its construction debt, but both the museum it houses and the West Virginia Symphony that performs there are having trouble balancing their budgets since moving in three years ago. The Clay Center has trimmed back its own performance season as it adjusts to less robust ticket demand than backers and consultants had forecast.

The state helped fund both those new buildings, then gave additional money -- through this very same capital grants program for Museum in the Community -- to help pay off the construction debt.

Wohl said that each new arts group and each new arts building has a tendency to spread available money and community support a wee bit thinner.

In related matters:

-- The arts commission will have $317,000 to give away this year, having lost a bureaucratic tug-of-war with Education and the Arts Secretary Kay Goodwin over an accumulated surplus in the capital grants program of $2.2 million. Goodwin recently fired Richard Ressmeyer, the staff person who had opposed what he saw as an unjust seizure.

With Ressmeyer gone, Landis wants to move on. "I haven't seen anyone step forward and say they would hire a lawyer," she said. "It's really important that we work together, especially in the arts. We can't accomplish much from an adversarial position." -- Wohl, Landis and the others considered capital grants requests ranging from $320,000 toward a $7 million auditorium at Wheeling Park High School that would serve the school and community to one for $5,800 from the Children's Home of Wheeling. The auditorium project might serve the Wheeling Symphony if it loses Capitol Music Hall, but the project has too many uncertainties and its backers should reapply next year, board members said. The Children's Home would serve just 38 troubled young males and would not be open to the public, Lambert pointed out. -- The city of Charleston asked for $131,000 toward a $13 million redo of the Municipal Auditorium. "Is it too little, too late?' asked Ned Eller, a board member who also happens to be an architect. "Why didn't they do this ahead of the Clay Center? Would the West Virginia Symphony move back?" -- Board members seemed sympathetic to the Huntington Museum of Art's request for $200,000 to replace a 54-year-old heating, air conditioning, and humidity control system in the oldest part of the building, replace a boiler in the 30-year-old addition, and begin replacing some oft-repaired roofs.

"It's not sexy. It's not glamorous," Wohl said. "But this is what this program was founded for."

Reached by phone, museum executive director Margaret Mary Layne said the museum has mapped out a $2 million, five-year program to take care of long-postponed needs and recently set about raising the money. "We now have a 20-year maintenance/replacement schedule."

To contact staff writer Bob Schwarz, use e-mail or call 348-1249.

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Copyright (c) 2006, The Charleston Gazette, W.Va.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.

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