School District 43 has released its year-end numbers for the Terry Fox Theatre since it changed its management structure for the Port Coquitlam venue.
Chris Nicolls, SD43’s assistant-treasurer, told The Tri-City News the theatre had 337 bookings from July 1, 2015 to June 30, 2016 — 216 of which came from external organizations, with the remainder associated with school-based activities for music, arts and other presentations.
Nicolls was not able to provide a comparison from the previous year.
Last June, SD43 unexpectedly severed ties with theatre manager Rick Rinder after months of negotiation over the facility operations and finances.
Without consulting city staff or council in Port Coquitlam — which in 1998 had contributed to building the 336-seat proscenium theatre attached to Terry Fox secondary, to ensure community use — SD43 turned the bookings over to a co-ordinator who was also in charge of all the district’s properties — school rooms, gyms, etc. — available for rental.
That re-structure saved the district up to $90,000 a year, Nicolls said, and “the transition to the rental approach has eliminated this subsidy completely.”
Nicolls said funding for the rental co-ordinator job is offset “by the expected increase in rental revenues”; the disclosure will be released as part of SD43’s financial report on Sept. 13.
Besides rentals management, the co-ordinator is also in charge of marketing Terry Fox Theatre. “We have established relationships with a number of performing arts companies that continue,” he said. “Word of mouth in the arts community and filming productions provide two important areas of marketing initiatives.”
Nicolls also confirmed the facilities’ regular maintenance scheduled has been kept up.
Rinder, who is well-known across Canada for theatre management and was hired by SD43 in November 2013, had warned before he left that Terry Fox Theatre and its technical equipment would fall into a state of disrepair if the venue wasn’t properly supervised.
Last year, the Port Coquitlam Theatre Society — of which Rinder replaced — donated $200,000 to the Port Coquitlam Community Foundation. The gift from the non-profit group was put into a new performing arts endowment fund managed by the philanthropical organization.
The society also made a contribution to the Vancouver Foundation for a scholarship/bursary fund for SD43 graduating students to help with post-secondary tuition for performance arts. In addition, it bought equipment for the Terry Fox Theatre.
