Council won't turn over Paramount management - for now

The City Council can give and it can take back.

Such was the case this week, when a council majority shifted gears after it decided three weeks ago to turn the management of the Paramount Theatre over to its principal tenant, Orchestra Iowa.

Tuesday evening, the council voted 7-1 - Mayor Ron Corbett was left alone to disagree - to reject a resolution to end the Paramount contract with the city's current manager of the theater, VenuWorks of Ames, Iowa.

Five members of the nine members of the council had directed the city manager on Oct. 5 to negotiate a management contract at the Paramount with Orchestra Iowa, but that majority vanished by Tuesday evening.

Nonetheless, by Wednesday, the only thing that was clear is that the City Council had more work to do before it decided just how the city would manage its four entertainment venues - the Paramount, the U.S. Cellular Center arena, the Ice Arena and the riverfront amphitheater. VenuWorks is under contract through June 30, 2013, to manage the first three. The Paramount and U.S. Cellular Center arena both are closed for renovation, and the amphitheater is under construction.

City Council member Chuck Swore on Wednesday said the council decided Tuesday evening that it didn't make sense to terminate VenuWorks' contract at the Paramount until the council knows more how it wants to manage all its entertainment venues in the future and until it knows better what a contract with Orchestra Iowa might look like.

“Let's not terminate a contract before we know what the alternative agreement might be,” Swore said. “My goodness, we have an awful lot of city investment at risk here.”

Robert Massey, executive director of Orchestra Iowa, on Wednesday said the orchestra still expected to move ahead in negotiations with City Manager Jeff Pomeranz to manage the Paramount as directed by the council at its Oct. 5 meeting.

“In talking to the city this morning, we don't' get the sense that that's changed,” Massey said.

He suggested that the council wanted to see the details of a management contract before it ends its relationship with VenuWorks at the Paramount.

“I liken it to, ‘You don't want to break up with one girl until you know the other one's going to go out with you,'” Massey said.

Council member Chuck Wieneke, who did not attend the Oct. 5 council meeting, led the move on Tuesday evening to keep the VenuWorks contract in place at the Paramount, at least for now.

On Wednesday, Wieneke said he will push for the city to continue to do what it currently does - employ one venue management company to oversee the operation of all the city-owned entertainment venues.

Wieneke said he is a strong supporter of Orchestra Iowa, but he said he disagrees that the orchestra is best positioned to attract acts to the Paramount Theatre, where most of the show dates are for acts other than the symphony, he said.

This week's vote, Wieneke said, revealed how soft the earlier vote had been to direct the city manager to negotiate a contract for the management of the Paramount with the symphony.

At the Oct. 5 meeting, council members Kris Gulick and Chuck Swore both questioned the sense and the extra expense of having more than one entity manage the city's entertainment venues. City Manager Jeff Pomeranz also expressed concern then that the city might be signing on to more administrative costs by having multiple entities manage the city's venues.

On Wednesday, Swore, who was chairman of the city's Five Seasons Facilities Commission back in 1979 when the city opened what is now called the U.S. Cellular Center arena, said a management firm tied into the “entertainment network” might better be able to bring more shows and events to the Paramount than Orchestra Iowa can.

He said Orchestra Iowa intended to have 12 symphony events and 24 other events a year at the Paramount and projected to lose $50,000 a year.

“I'm not satisfied that the Paramount will be used 36 times a year,” Swore said. “I want it to be opened as many days as we can without disrupting what the symphony does.”

Swore said the prospect of losing $50,000 a year - Wieneke said the theater made a $50,000 profit in 2007 - made council members start to think, “Oops, maybe we ought to reconsider” just how the city intends to have the Paramount managed.

Massey said he has plenty of past experience in Washington, D.C., and Memphis, Tenn., at attracting acts to an entertainment venue, and he said it isn't “rocket science.” Most of the acts that the orchestra's management would attract to the Paramount would be those running on multiple nights. Some dates, he added, need to be left open for other performing arts groups in the city. He expected the theater under orchestra management to be booked 51 weekends a year with the symphony, Broadway shows, dance shows, country acts and other shows. The Paramount has been “dark” too many days in the past, he said.

Massey said the orchestra's initial budget proposal to the city does not expect to run a $50,000 debt a year, but anticipates that the city will continue to steer an estimated $50,000 a year in revenue from the city's hotel/motel tax to the Paramount as the city has done in the past.