Lively Debate on Study Ahead : Spreckels--Not Balboa--Fix-up Urged

A 10-year program for the performing arts downtown that calls for rehabilitation of the privately owned Spreckels Theatre instead of the publicly owned Balboa Theater was unveiled before the City Council Thursday.

The recommendation drew immediate fire from Balboa Theater preservationists, who called the study “irrelevant.”

Commissioned by the council last year and prepared by theater and marketing consultants, the study includes a needs assessment by several potential users of downtown theaters, a cost analysis for renovating existing theaters and building new ones, and various financing options.

Harrison Price Co. of Los Angeles, a marketing firm, and New York-based Theatre Projects Consultants prepared the extensive survey of downtown theater needs for the next 10 years.

Centre City Development Corp. Executive Vice President Gerald Trimble, whose agency administered the study, stressed to the crowd of theater professionals who half-filled the council chambers that the presentation was not “a meeting just to deal with the Balboa Theater,” which has been the focus of continuing debate over whether it should be preserved or converted into a modern art museum.

However, a significant portion of the presentation centered on the comparative merits of the Balboa, Spreckels and California theaters for renovation as downtown’s primary 1,200- to 1,500-seat theater. In its analysis, the study found the Spreckels, at 1st Avenue and Broadway, to be the best suited for rehabilitation.

“If only one theater were to be renovated, there is no doubt that this honor should go to the Spreckels Theatre from a purely technical standpoint,” the study said. “San Diego possesses in this building one of the finest theaters in the U.S.”

The consultants said the privately owned California Theatre, at 4th Avenue and C Street, could be improved primarily by expanding its size through the purchase of additional land. The Balboa Theater, at 4th Avenue and E Street, “presents the most significant problems” for renovation due to its relatively shallow stage depth and small lobby.

In interviews with 56 local performing arts professionals and organizations, the consultants found that the size most in demand is a 1,200- to 1,500-seat theater. Eleven groups expressed a need for a theater of this size. There is a lesser demand for both larger and smaller theaters, the survey showed.

The greatest theater need of all, however, proved to be for rehearsal, office and classroom space.

Robert Purvin, general counsel of the Balboa Theater Foundation, formed to preserve the theater, challenged the report.

“Why would the city want to destroy a theater it owns and buy another one?” he asked. “All of the other theaters have to be acquired somehow.”

Tom Hall, general manager of the Old Globe Theatre, agreed with the report, saying it matched his “gut reaction” to the downtown theaters.

Mayor Maureen O’Connor referred the report to CCDC for a recommendation to the council in about six weeks.