First, the Star Bar Players left the Lon Chaney Theater because the City Auditorium wouldn’t guarantee their dates. Now AlleyCat Theatrics, the premier children’s theater company in town, may be forced out due to higher rents.

As part of the ongoing budget cuts, the city has proposed raising the daily rental rate for the venerable theater from $280 to $350 (according to the city web site, it was $175 as recently as the end of last year). And Alan Koch, director of AlleyCat, says the city will more than double his night rate for rehearsals. These combined rent hikes have driven him to search for a new venue.

I understand that with the defeat of 2C, the city needs to make budget cuts. And it’s reasonable for the city council to consider raising rental fees in order to cover the cost of actually operating a particular facility.

The problem is that in their budget proposals, the city is using a static, not dynamic, model. They assume that in order to increase rental revenues by 25%, they simply have to raise the rental rate by 25%. 

Obviously, this model breaks down if renters flee, as AlleyCat is about to do.

It’s hard for me to imagine who could make a go of it there. As a theatre company for kids interested in developing their performance skills, AlleyCat has a luxury few other theater companies in town have: they can charge parents tuition for their children’s training plus require a minimum ticket buy per family (full disclosure: I’ve been one of those parents).

Smaller companies like the Star Bar Players and the new Springs Ensemble Theatre, on the other hand, subsist almost entirely on individual ticket sales, which can be as little as $5 a person, and whatever donations they can drum up.

If AlleyCat Theatrics can’t make it, who can?

I hope the city wakes up and realizes it’s better to make $280 per day than $0.

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